


Retrieving Fódlan’s Locket.

by strawberrymango



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: F/F, M/M, additional background raphael/ignatz, also angst and i have a very strained relationship so dont expect to find her here, background dimidue, background jeritza/byleth, i'll add tags as i go along i guess, lin and cas are here because im incapable of writing something without them, rated M for language only, this is a leonie love zone, this is just gonna be a fun ol' time
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-18
Updated: 2020-03-19
Packaged: 2020-12-23 17:21:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 105,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21085016
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strawberrymango/pseuds/strawberrymango
Summary: Claude Riegan is Fódlan’s youngest and most famous retrieval artist. He and his team have returned countless numbers of priceless artifacts and heirlooms to their rightful owners over the years, but none have proved quite as interesting as the mystery of Fódlan’s Locket.With an enigmatic and elusive thief to catch up with, new and unwanted members of the team to contend with, and slews of new challenges making the path a difficult and dangerous one to tread, Claude might have just encountered his biggest challenge yet. But that doesn't mean it won't be fun.





	1. FÓDLAN’S LOCKET

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to my newest story! I've been wanting to write this for so long because I love the Golden Deer and I love Claude, so please enjoy my excuse just to have fun writing these kids being chaotic.

CHAPTER ONE: CLAUDE

FÓDLAN’S LOCKET

Claude was used to his employers residing in huge, ostentatious buildings. In his experience, people with money always tended to gravitate towards the hideous like it was some kind of legally binding requirement. _Money _must_ equate to large and tragically ugly. _Claude was no interior designer, but he was quite positive that he’d never in a million years think to put such horrendously tiled floors across a reception area so large. He’d been staring at the intricately busy pattern of royal-blue and gold for a solid forty minutes in his wait to be summoned by his newest temporary employer, and he still hadn’t managed to work out what exactly the pattern was trying to depict. It was starting to give him a headache.

The reception area of the Blaidydd Company wasn’t the _most_ spacious room Claude had ever found himself waiting an unbearably long amount of time in. Still, it was large enough to be completely unnecessary; the building was practically empty and that didn’t look as though it would change any time soon. What the company needed a reception area of at least fifty cushioned chairs and sofas for when it was this hauntingly quiet, Claude had no earthly clue. But he was there nonetheless, leafing absentmindedly through a magazine and tapping his foot upon the ugly tiles to the pop song he’d gotten stuck in his head during the drive over.

The shrill sound of a telephone made Claude look up from the article about the season’s newest fashion trends he’d been skimming, in order to watch the receptionist nod in to the phone’s handset. A moment later, she slotted it quietly back in to the receiver and stood, making pointed eye contact with Claude to tell him that “Mr. Blaidydd will see you now, sir.”

“Much appreciated,” Claude said with a smile. He folded his magazine closed and threw it back on to the nearest glass table, rolling his shoulder to rid himself of the stiffness that came with sitting politely still for almost an hour.

“It’s just through those doors. The room at the end of the corridor,” the receptionist clarified, settling back down in her seat to continue playing whatever game she had been occupying herself with on her phone. Claude nodded and set a brisk pace for the office.

Much to his relief, the ugly reception tiles faded in to a much more bearable off-white once he had escaped through the heavy glass doors. They did nothing to relieve his décor-induced headache however. The walls to his right were lined with ceiling-to-floor windows and the sun beat relentlessly through the glass, reflecting off of the shiny surface of the tiles to make them seem impossibly brighter. Claude suddenly wished that he had remembered to grab his sunglasses before locking up the car. Maybe then he could have protected himself from the blinding assault on his eyeballs.

The door at the end of the corridor looked like every other door; only an engraved name plaque told Claude that is was any more special than the previous four he’d passed. Claude read the name ‘Dimitri Alexandre Blaidydd’ with quirked lips and an eyebrow raised in amusement. How he’d managed to squeeze so many letters on such a small plaque was quite an impressive feat, even if it was a wholly unnecessary one.

Claude knocked on the door four times, having learned his lesson that entering un-announced was definitely _not_ worth the element of surprise. Though it _had_ make him privy to many a delicious secret over the years. Claude looked down at his shirt, straightened it out, and adjusted the golden deer pin on his chest just like Lysithea had told him to. He waited for the muted “_Come in,”_ from the other side of the door before pushing it open and slipping inside.

Dimitri Alexandre Blaidydd’s office was spacious and mostly empty, save for a few bookshelves and some large indoor plants thrown carelessly in to the corners – most likely in an attempt to fill the space. It seemed as though the interior designer’s bravado had all but vanished when tackling the decoration of the boss’ office – as though all creative direction had run dry and left Dimitri with nothing but some white walls and sparsely placed mahogany furniture. The windows were the same floor-to-ceiling kind as the ones in the corridor however, and Claude could see the city of Faerghus spreading out across the skyline, moving busily and chaotically like an animated painting.

The man himself sat behind an expensive desk, finely turned out in a crisp white shirt and tie, suit jacket forgone in the early afternoon heat. Much like the rest of his office, Dimitri's desk was decidedly devoid of life. Claude had to wonder how much time he actually spent in his own company building, if any at all. There were absolutely no personal touches whatsoever, not even a framed photograph of his family or something equally as sentimental claimed any kind of space upon his desk.

“Ah, good morning, Mr. Riegan.” Dimitri rose from his chair to offer Claude a hand. Claude spared an inquisitive glance at the man sitting next to Dimitri - his stern expression and strong-looking physique were equally as intimidating as they were impressive, and made Claude stand a little straighter. He took Dimitri’s hand in a lukewarm shake and gave him one of his most charmingly reassuring smiles. “I must apologise for the prolonged wait. We’ve had quite the morning.”

“No trouble on my end,” Claude said, taking the seat opposite Dimitri’s. “Though I will offer you a word of advice; a vending machine would do your reception area wonders. Even if you would only fill it with rich-people snacks or something equally as depressing.”

Dimitri chuckled and sat back in his own seat. His laugh held no mirth, Claude couldn’t help but notice, and his eyes looked red and tired, as though he’d forgotten about sleep altogether.

Dimitri ran a hand through his long blonde fringe and sighed; it was the sigh of a man teetering on the edge of calm. Claude was well acquainted with the signs by now – his clients were rarely calm when they turned to him for help. “I suppose I should waste no time in explaining why I’ve called you here,” he said.

“Well, that certainly would be helpful,” Claude replied. “My employers are usually extremely eager to spit any and all information they can at me down the phone before we’ve even met. Colour me intrigued by your secrecy, Your Princeliness, and I’ll make my final decision once I’ve heard the facts.”

Dimitri offered another half-hearted laugh in response to the name and relaxed his upright posture to a hunched slouch. “Something of mine has been taken from me,” he said with a solemn bow of his head. Claude resisted the urge to roll his eyes and say "_obviously". _“It was given to me by my step-mother before she died.” He seemed to wait for Claude’s reaction to such information, so Claude offered a nod of his head to prompt the rest of the story. “Fódlan’s Locket, until two days ago, was kept in a safe in this very office room.”

“May I ask where?” Claude hadn’t spotted any places an heirloom could have been safely hidden upon his entrance. That meant there was more to the room than what met the eye, and that definitely piqued Claude’s interest – he liked to know secrets.

“Behind that bookshelf is a safe,” Dimitri explained, pointing to the large mahogany shelf against the wall opposite his desk. “It was securely locked inside, secured with a combination that only myself, and my Head of Security, Dedue, know.”

At the mention of his name, the man Dimitri had called Dedue bowed his head in acknowledgement at his side. “That is true,” he said, voice deep and resonating. “And I have not told another living soul the combination.”

“Before you go making any baseless accusations,” Dimitri cut in rather forcefully. “I would trust Dedue with my life. He had nothing to do with this.”

Claude raised his hands in the air in mock surrender. “I was actually going to keep any and all accusations under my tongue until I had heard the story in its entirety. You understand that in my profession, nothing good ever comes of jumping to conclusions.”

Dimitri seemed to settle down upon hearing Claude’s words and let out another shaky sigh. “I apologise,” he said. “Many people have already fabricated their own versions of events, and they all seem to have it in their heads to blame Dedue to some capacity.”

“I understand and appreciate your concern, Your Princeliness, but I am not that foolish. Please continue.”

“Yes, of course” Dimitri said, clearing his throat and sparing Dedue a weary glance. Dedue fixed him with an encouraging nod and Dimitri continued. “Two days ago, I returned here at a late hour from a rather strenuous meeting. I was just going to pick up some documents from my desk to take home when I noticed that the bookcase was slightly askew.”

“Askew?”

“Yes, it wasn’t quite against the wall properly, and a few of my books had been moved from their original order. I like to keep them colour coordinated, you see, and they had been placed back incorrectly.”

“Interesting. What did you do next?” Claude always found those stories the most interesting. What did those targeted by heists do once they had realised their goods had been taken from right under their noses? Claude often wasn’t around to ever see the aftermath, but he did get to hear the grand tales from his clients.

“I sent my two personal guards to check the rest of the building for any sign of the thief, and then I called Dedue and waited for him to arrive. When he got here, we moved the bookcase to find that the safe door was still securely locked. Dedue suggested I open it to check, just in case, and low and behold, the locket was gone.”

“The safe was securely locked? There was no sign of forced entry?”

“None whatsoever,” Dedue said with a shake of his head. “It was as though they had already known the combination.”

Claude let out a low whistle. “From what I can gather,” he said, leaning back in his chair, “I have a sneaking suspicion that no matter who your Head of Security was, or what safe you had kept your locket secure within, your thief was very determined to take it, and would have done so regardless of any precautions you had put in place. I’m not sure there was much you could have done, save for wearing the locket to bed, and even then, with a skilled pick-pocket, I’m not sure you’d even notice it being taken from your own neck.”

The bookshelf was heavy - Claude had arrived at that conclusion rather quickly after only sparing it a brief glance. Anyone who could have moved something of that size, bypassed what Claude hopefully assumed was a pretty complex safe, and then managed to escape from the twentieth floor of an office building undetected, must have been something of a genius. Claude couldn’t stop the smile from spreading across his face at the prospect of a good challenge.

“But who could have done this? And who would have known where to look?” Dimitri asked.

“That’s what I was about to ask _you,_” Claude said. “You’re telling me there’s nobody you’ve ever discussed this locket with? Nobody that might hold some kind of grudge against you, or might be strapped for cash enough to attempt a robbery?”

“I can think of no one who would slight me in such a way. I only keep company with a very tight-knit group of friends, and should any of them fall in to the slightest bit of trouble, they know all too well that I’d do everything in my power to help them out of it.”

“That’s very sweet and all,” Claude said, “but that’s not what I’m asking. I’m asking if you have any _enemies_. Think long and hard, Mr. Blaidydd. Surely there must be someone?”

Clients often thought, despite being ungodly amounts rich and powerful, that they were selfless, angelic deities with not a single conceivable enemy in existence. Claude always took great pleasure in reassuring them that they weren’t, in fact, the self-proclaimed demi-gods they imagined themselves to be. Most of the time, Claude only had to run a basic background check to locate at least two-dozen people who had solid reasoning to either want his client dead or hopelessly bankrupt. It was nothing short of euphoric to watch their faces pale when Claude reeled off the lists of possible enemies during their later meetings.

“I’ll leave you alone to think on it,” Claude said, watching Dimitri’s brows furrow and jaw set as he trawled through his own memory for possibilities. “Dedue, if you could help me with the bookcase? I’d like to have a little look at your safe.”

Claude rolled up the sleeves of his shirt and stood. Dedue gave Dimitri one last look before mirroring him and following Claude over to the bookcase. “See here,” Dedue said, his calm baritone very soothing to Claude’s ears after hearing Dimitri’s shaky recollection of events. “Dimi—Ah, Mr. Blaidydd likes to keep his books organised. I instructed him to keep the crime scene exactly as he found it once we were sure it had been stolen, so this here is nigh on what we discovered two days ago.”

Claude thanked the gods that Dedue had the common sense not to touch anything. The amount of clients that had disrupted crucial evidence before Claude had even gotten the chance to look at it was nothing short of infuriating. More often than not, people who stole things tended to leave behind some form of trail whether they intended to or not, and that kind of information was vital to people like Claude and his team, especially if it meant that he could recognise a thief’s signature style and narrow down the search.

Claude looked up at the books in question; a row that had been dedicated to blue-covered books had been disrupted with intervals of red. Claude narrowed his eyes at the precise and even spacing of the books’ placement and shifted his gaze to the shelf that held the red books instead. Surely enough, the missing blue books had been slotted just as carefully in to place between the red ones; it definitely didn’t scream of an accidental and haphazard attempt at cleaning up after knocking them free. Not in the slightest.

Keeping his thoughts to himself, Claude readied a hand on a corner of the bookcase and waited for Dedue to do the same on the other side. Together, they heaved the stacked shelves out of the way and Claude grimaced when the wood groaned against the white tiles rather unpleasantly. For a moment, Claude wondered just how far the sound could travel. It definitely felt like it was loud enough to be heard along the entire corridor, and it was entirely possible that the noise could have reverberated through the tiles to carry down to the floor below.

The safe sat inside a conveniently cut hole in the wall. It was a generic and unimpressive wall safe – Claude had seen plenty of them in his time and had also watched Marianne the Safe Whisperer bust just as many of them open. Claude reached up to grab the metal handle – it had been locked again.

“What’s the code?” Claude asked.

“I’m not sure that would be—”

“Listen, it’s already been broken in to. There’s nothing left inside it to protect and you’re going to have to change it anyway,” Claude said, cutting Dedue off before he could decline further.

“Seven, three, seven, four, one, five, nine, eight, three, one, two, zero, nine,” Dimitri said without looking up from where his gaze was fixed upon a notepad he was scribbling in.

Claude blinked owlishly at Dimitri and then turned to Dedue. “Uh, why don’t you just go on ahead and open it up for me.”

Dedue sighed and opened the safe, tapping the long string of numbers in to the keypad. With the press of each button came a complimentary _beep_ and when the final number was pressed, the safe made a series of higher pitched beeping sounds and popped open. The space inside was large – Claude couldn’t believe such a large safe had been employed to hold such a tiny object. It would have been comical, had the locket still been inside it and not stolen by possibly one of the most organised thieves Claude had ever encountered.

No sign whatsoever of forced entry – Claude knew the signs to look for. No such crowbar marks marred the black metal door, and there were no scratches in the paint or dents or holes in the wall surrounding it. The thief _had_ to have known the combination, and after hearing the impossibly long string of numbers for himself, Claude was all the more impressed that the thief had managed to learn them from a pair of such cautious and secretive individuals without raising suspicion.

“Did you call the police?” was Claude’s next question.

“No,” Dedue answered on Dimitri’s behalf. “I instructed him not to. The police would only prolong the investigation with needless protocol and, ultimately, they would have prevented us from contacting you.”

Claude pulled his keys from his pocket and singled out the novelty cat-torch keyring Hilda got him for his birthday last year to shine it inside. “Good call. The police aren’t exactly our biggest fans. I don’t think they much enjoy the way that we do their job better than them.”

“Your reputation certainly is impressive,” Dedue said, leaning against the bookcase with his arms crossed over his chest. He kept sparing glances in Dimitri’s direction with lines of worry etched in to his forehead, but said nothing to distract him.

Claude crouched to get a better look inside, using the cheap, weak light of his torch to look around. “Yes, well, they don’t call me Riegan the Retriever for nothing.”

“I was under the impression that you were referred to as the Master Tactician,” Dedue said distantly.

“I have a lot of names,” Claude said. “It’s getting hard to keep track—Oh. What’s this?”

“What is it? What have you found?” Dedue stood up straight, straining to look over Claude’s shoulder to find the source of his interest.

“I think we’d better take a seat,” Claude said, keeping his newly found evidence safely within the closed palm of his hand. Dedue fixed him with a glare, but Claude was undeterred. “After you,” he said, gesturing towards the desk.

Dimitri finally looked up from his notebook when both Claude and Dedue found their seats again. He looked haggard and vacant, as though the mere act of thinking had drained him of any remaining energy he might have been holding on to. _He must really care for that locket,_ Claude thought, tightening his grip on the paper between his fingers.

“I’ve made a list,” Dimitri said. “These are all the people I can think of that I’ve talked to in recent months. Maybe one of them has some connection to the theft.” Dimitri tore the page from his book and slid it across the table. Claude grimaced when his eyes fell upon it. It was covered, front and back in completely illegible handwriting – Claude supposed the scribbles were supposed to represent the names of people, but he couldn’t make out what a single one of them said. He just hoped that Ignatz would be able to decipher it.

“This might very well prove useful,” Claude lied, pocketing the list. “Because it seems to me as though your thief is very intent on making themselves known to you.”

Dimitri’s frown deepened. “What do you mean by that?”

“I mean, that whoever it is, is doing their best to leave you hints. To taunt you, as it were.” When Dedue and Dimitri just stared at him with identical puzzled expressions, Claude explained. “Your books. If they had fallen to the floor when the shelf had been moved, they almost certainly would have been returned to random locations upon the shelf, with complete disregard for placement – someone who’s rushing to make an escape does not have time to think about putting everything back in the correct order.”

“So… the books are a message?” Dimitri asked.

“Possibly. But I’m more of a mind that it’s a display of victory – a blotch of red marring your very_ blue_ building, Mr. Blaidydd. Symbolism and all that. Your thief is so confident, that they took the time to rearrange your shelves just to let you know how thoroughly and successfully they have infiltrated your life, and bested you.”

“But I don’t understand,” Dimitri said, voice sounding desperate. “Why would someone do that?”

“More importantly,” Dedue cut in, “how can you be sure? It could simply be coincidence that the books ended up in such a way.”

“I highly doubt that,” Claude said. “Thieves tend to have a flare for the dramatic. Also, they left this.” Claude slid the piece of paper he had found stuck to the ceiling of the safe across the table. Dimitri took it hesitantly, brushing his finger across the sleek black paper as he read its contents.

_Fódlan’s Locket has now been returned to its rightful owner. _

_The Flame Emperor implores you to refrain from taking things that do not belong to you._

“What is this nonsense?” Dimitri said, throwing the card back across the table at Claude as though it burned him to touch it.

Claude picked up the card and pocketed it alongside the list of names. “It looks as though the Flame Emperor has some conflicting ideas about your precious little heirloom. Anything you want to tell me before I begin investigating?”

“It was mine!” Dimitri was bordering on shouting. Dedue settled a hand on his shoulder and Dimitri seemed to calm somewhat under it before continuing in a slightly more hushed tone. “My step-mother gave it to me herself. She _told_ me it belonged to me. It’s _mine _and I want it back.”

Claude grinned, leaning back in his chair to study his new employer. “You’ve definitely come to the right person.”

“You’re going to accept our case?” Dedue asked, eyebrow raised.

_Hm,_ Claude thought with something akin to smugness. _Seems as though my reputation _does_ precede me._ “Well,” he pulled a card of paper from his shirt’s breast pocket and leaned forward to pass it to Dimitri. “Let’s say you’ve sufficiently managed to intrigue me. We’ll discuss details over the phone at a later time, but I what I _can_ say as of right now, is that you’ll definitely be getting your locket back, Mr. Blaidydd.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

“Listen up, kids!” Claude kicked open the door to Headquarters and after the initial screams of shock subsided, every face inside turned to listen with rapt attention. Claude scanned the various degrees of concern with a concealed grin and clapped his hands together. “Pack everything up! We’ve been compromised!”

“Aw shit, Claude. Not again,” Hilda groaned from where she was sitting cross-legged atop the kitchen table, painting her nails a new shade of pink. She made absolutely no effort to move whatsoever. “What did you do this time?”

“Actually, it’s not my fault. You can direct any and all blame unto Mr. Dimitri Insistent Blaidydd and his incredibly persuasive amounts of money.”

Hilda put the nail polish brush back in to its pot to turn her entire attention Claude’s way. “How much are we talking?” she said with interest, blowing air at her nails to dry them.

Claude grinned. “Enough to move our new Headquarters to that huge building you had your eye on in Garreg Mach.”

There wasn’t much wrong with their current Headquarters – it was a large, single floor warehouse-turned-house with more than enough rooms to give everyone a place to work. The kitchen and living room shared one open space that made it easy to talk to everyone at the same time, and it was satisfactorily hidden from prying public eyes. It was Claude’s favourite place yet – he was going to miss it terribly when they left, unidentifiable stains and all.

Hilda let out an exaggerated and indecent groan and hopped down off the table. “Claude! You have to warn a girl before you say something so unbelievably and incredibly sexy.”

“New client?” Ignatz tactfully intercepted Claude’s response with an embarrassed cough, crossing the room to begin the arduous routine of powering down all seven of his laptops. Claude wasn’t sure why he even needed seven laptops, but then again, he wasn’t entirely sure why Linhardt and Lysithea needed a combined twelve laptops and six desktops between them either. He’d learned not to question the tech division by now – they almost always answered in riddles, using copious amounts of computer jargon that was impossible to understand. Claude had all but given up attempting to learn their language long ago.

“A very _interesting_ new client,” Claude grinned. “We’ve bagged ourselves a ‘cocky taunter’.”

As though summoned, Lorenz appeared at the door of his office with his lips curled downwards in disgust. His long purple hair was pulled back in a bun and he was wearing his tight, all-black work gear. Claude’s smile widened. “Must you insist upon using such tasteless terminology, Claude?”

“There’s nothing tasteless about pride, Lorenz. It’s actually quite valuable.”

“There may be nothing inherently wrong with having pride in oneself, but your phraseology remains abhorrent.”

“What the fuck does phraseology mean?” Caspar asked from his place on the sofa. He was playing Mario Kart with Lysithea and Leonie, but had paused the game to fix Lorenz with a confused glare. “Can’t you just use ordinary people words?”

“‘Phraseology’ _is_ an ‘ordinary people’ word, Caspar. It’s not my fault you lack the refinement to know such things.”

“I don’t know man.” Caspar shook his head and started the game back up suddenly, much to Leonie’s dismay. “I think I’d rather listen to Claude talk about cock torture than whatever made-up shit you keep spouting.”

“Cocky taunter,” Claude reminded him.

“Yeah, that—aw fuck, I crashed.”

“_Karma,_” Leonie muttered under her breath.

Lorenz sighed and turned his attention back to Claude with a careful roll of his eyes. “Are we just going to continue watching this depressingly subpar display of digital go-karting all afternoon? Or are you going to elaborate on this new client?”

“Ah, yes! So,” Claude began, taking a seat on one of the sofas and ignoring the protestant complaints from those playing. “Mr. Blaidydd had an heirloom – something called Fódlan’s Locket – a gift from his dead step-mother. Kept it in a wall safe behind a huge bookcase.”

“A wall safe,” Lorenz grimaced.

“Tell me about it,” Claude continued. “So, he goes out to a meeting two days ago – returns to his office at precisely one-thirty-three a.m. to find his bookcase ‘askew’ and multiple of his books rearranged. He calls his Head of Security and they move the case to find the safe still completely intact, but the locket missing from inside.”

Hilda let out a whistle, much like the one Claude had upon hearing the information. “Someone trying to steal Marianne the Safe Whisper’s title? Do I have to break out my axe?”

“Would seem that way,” Claude laughed, and waited for Caspar to stop shouting at the screen for losing the race before continuing. “The code was ridiculously long, I’m talking five-billion digits, and the only two who know it, are Dimitri and his Head of Security, who, I quote, he ‘trusts with his life’.”

“Bit dramatic,” Lysithea piped up from the floor. She muttered a dozen curses and threw her controller aside after coming last to fixate her energy towards the cold pizza on the table instead.

“I don’t know, you should have seen him. He was _huge_. Like, Raphael-level mega shredded. I bet he could snap Lorenz in half like a twig. I’d probably trust him with my life too.”

“Most of us could probably snap Lorenz in half,” Leonie reminded him. “I bet even _Linhardt_ could if he really—”

“Please continue, Claude,” Lorenz cut in tersely with a pointed glare in Leonie’s direction.

“Yeah, OK. So, I had a peek inside the safe. There was definitely no mistake – whoever broke in used the code and nothing else. Not a scratch on the thing. Then I found this—” Claude held out the little black card, neatly and professionally printed with embossed silver writing.

Hilda plucked it from Claude’s fingers and read it aloud. “_The Flame Emperor implores you to refrain from taking things that do not belong to you,” _she said in a dramatically lowered voice. “The _Flame Emperor_? What is this, some kind of video game? Who uses names like that?”

“Right? It’s almost as bad as Black Eagle Strike Force. No offence,” he gestured towards Caspar and a sleeping Linhardt who was sprawled out on the floor with nothing but a flattened pillow. Claude was glad – he wasn’t sure Linhardt had actually been to sleep for a solid seventy-four hours. He’d said something about making a breakthrough in a new area of research but he either must have completed said research or given up on it entirely because now he looked unsettlingly comatose.

“None taken,” Caspar shrugged.

“So this… Mr. Blaidydd,” Lorenz said, twirling his hand in the air for emphasis. “He knows of nobody who might have motive for such a brazen theft?”

“Apparently, he only keeps the _best_ company,” Claude scoffed and fished out the scrawled list of names from his pocket. “But he did give me this list of possible suspects. Hey, Ignatz, see if you can decipher any of this shit and type me up a _legible_ list.”

“I thought we were powering down and packing up.” Ignatz looked exasperated as he closed the lid of his last laptop, but took the list anyway.

“Yeah, buddy, we’re not leaving until tomorrow morning. It was just a figure of speech.”

“Why doesn’t anyone ever stop me,” he sighed and turned to face everyone on the sofas. “You all just sat by and watched.”

“I’m not your mother,” Lysithea shrugged.

“Exactly. She’s just a tiny baby,” Claude cooed.

Lysithea scowled and threw a piece of cold pepperoni at Claude’s shirt, leaving a round, saucy stain in its wake. “Aw, looks like big dumb baby Claude got food all over his favourite shirt like a big huge dumb baby,” she spat, flicking a long lock of white hair over her shoulder.

“Point received, processed and filed away for future reference.” Claude frowned, trying to rub the unsightly red stain from what Lysithea correctly identified as his favourite shirt – a rich gold colour, intricately patterned with white flowers. He’d gotten it on sale; it was a masterpiece. And now it had a ring of tomato residue spoiling it.

“I guess I’ll get started on this then,” Ignatz said, taking one of his laptops to his room. There was something of a small smile tugging at the corner of his lips and Claude wanted to laugh. Ignatz loved graphology – said that you could tell a lot about a person from their handwriting. “_It’s like an art form,”_ he would always say. Claude guessed that was why he was so exceptional at forgery, because he had such a love for the fine arts.

“I still haven’t heard an actual reason for why we’re being forced to move,” Hilda said. “Not that I’m complaining, that new place is right next to _a sauna_.” She was right – the new place was nothing to complain about. Hilda had been eyeing it up for years, begging Claude to waste unlawful amounts of money in securing it. Back then they hadn’t had the funds to support such a huge spend. But _now, _Claude could probably buy one for each of his team members and still have enough left over for a party.

“Oh, yeah. Dimitri wants to foist two members of his team off on us. Says he’ll pay extra and will feel more at ease if we have help from people who know more about him and his business than anyone else. I declined, of course, but he seemed to just keep adding zeros to the bank transfer amount and, well, I’m not an_ idiot_. I had to give up the address for them to join us later this afternoon.”

A chorus of dissatisfied groans and protests filled the air and Claude basked in it, leaning his head back against the cushioned sofa. They could whine to their hearts’ content - they were getting paid serious money to babysit Dimitri’s guards. Claude was even contemplating rolling out a red carpet and popping champagne upon their arrival.

“Not _more_ newbies,” Leonie groaned.

“Aw yeah!” Caspar threw his fist in the air and turned to Claude with a hopeful smile. He gestured between himself and Linhardt, “Does this mean we’re no longer the newbies?”

“Absolutely not, newbie,” Claude said, closing his eyes and putting his arms behind his head. “These are only temporary newbies.”

“Damn. Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

“Do they even _know_ what we do?” Lorenz asked. He didn’t look very impressed by the prospect of forced help, but then again, Lorenz always did have impossibly high standards. Even if he were enlisting the help of two top-tier agents, he’d probably have _something_ to say about their conduct or methods not quite meeting his own. Claude couldn’t argue with him on it though – Lorenz was an unparalleled expert in his field. That was why Claude had hired him in the first place.

“Probably not,” Claude laughed. “We’ve more than likely got two clueless civilians on our hands. But don’t worry,” Claude said jokingly in response to the look of sheer disgust on Lorenz’s face, “I plan on leaving them in the hotel most of the time. I might even get them some soundproof headphones so they don’t know what we’re doing or where we’re going.”

“That’s not a bad idea,” Hilda said, touching a newly manicured finger to her lip. “We could blindfold them and tie them up too!”

“No, Hilda. I’m pretty sure that’s borderline torture.”

“Aw, really?”

“Yes,” Claude said warily. He sometimes seriously doubted his decision to appoint Hilda his second in command, especially in times such as these when she nonchalantly suggested things like torture. “What time do Raph and Marianne get back? The temps will be here at four.”

“Raph’s sister doesn’t get out of school until three, and then he’s picking up Marianne from her appointment at half past. They might make it back just in time, depending on the traffic,” Hilda said, swiping her phone to check her calendar. It never ceased to amaze Claude that for someone who kept such a detailed schedule, Hilda still managed to turn up late to everything, if at all.

“Cool. I want everyone to be here when I start the official ball rolling. So…” he said carefully. “What does everyone make of our newest client? Any objections?”

It came as no surprise that Lorenz managed to get his voice heard first. “It certainly sounds intriguing,” he said. “This might just pose our most challenging retrieval yet - it doesn’t appear as though we have an awful lot to go on.”

“Yeah, that’s what I’m afraid of,” Claude admitted. “Other than the Flame Emperor and a list of thirty other random names, we’re going to have to build the case from scratch.”

“If Mr. Rich Boy keeps throwing money at us,” Hilda shrugged, “then I don’t think it’s going to be that hard.”

“He seems intent on getting back this locket,” Leonie mused, kicking her feet up on to the glass coffee table. Bits of mud from the grooves of her soles dusted the surface upon impact, landing dangerously close to the pizza box. Lysithea yelped and leaped across it to save the food. “Oops, sorry,” Leonie said without moving her feet. “Is he sure that it really belongs to him? Why would someone hire top-tier professional help to steal it if they weren’t _totally_ sure of its origins? Are we on the right side here?”

His team grumbled in muted agreement – they’d experienced their fair share of clients with carefully concealed secrets that have come back to bite them in the ass before. Claude couldn’t blame them for their apprehension, but then they hadn’t been sat opposite Dimitri.

“He seems to think that there’s no mistaking his ownership. Said that his step-mother gave it to him herself. Explicitly named him the heir. I believe him,” Claude said with resolution. Dimitri had appeared extremely vulnerable in his plea for help. Claude couldn’t detect a shred of deceit, nor could he think of a conceivable reason for him to lie. Especially not when he was losing alarming amounts of money to get it back through such unconventional means. Claude was confident that Dimitri was _not_ that great of an actor.

“A job is a job,” Caspar shrugged.

“Yeah, I don’t really care either way,” Lysithea said. “So long as I get to test out my new camera software.”

“That’s why you’re my favourite,” Claude sighed wistfully.

“Why? Because she doesn’t question your irresponsible and irrational tendencies?” Lorenz asked with a raised brow. Claude wanted to counter that Lysithea was arguably the _most_ disobedient of the entire crew when she put her mind to something, but deemed it irrelevant in the face of more pressing matters.

“Is that _jealousy_ I detect, Lorenz? Aw don’t worry, you’re still my second favourite—” Hilda coughed at his side. “_Third_ favourite.” Hilda whispered “_Marianne_” in his ear and Claude winced. “OK, you’re somewhere on the list, and that’s what matters, right?”

“You are seriously misunderstood if you think I care an ounce about where I fall on your list of favourites,” Lorenz said.

“_Pfft_,” Hilda scoffed and then covered her mouth quickly. “Sorry,” she said with a wheeze. “That’s just _so_ funny because—”

“That’s quite enough, Hilda,” Lorenz snapped, stalking off to his office. Claude didn’t miss the flush of his cheeks though and hid a small smile behind his hand. “Call me when we’re going to drop the useless chatter and get some actual work done," he said over his shoulder.

“Will do, Lorenz!” Caspar called after him. “Call me when you’re finally ready to yank the stick from your ass. I’ll give you a hand!” The sound of the door slamming was the only response Caspar received. He didn’t seem perturbed, he just shrugged and reached for his drink.

“Were I not a lesbian, I’d probably be in love with you,” Leonie said, patting Caspar on the shoulder.

Caspar beamed and gave her a thumbs up. “Aw thanks, Leonie. That’s real kind of you.”

Approval was nice to hear from the team – Claude hated putting them in situations they didn’t like, or making them work for people they didn’t much care for. He could already tell that he’d managed to intrigue most of them with the unusual circumstances surrounding the case and it felt like a weight had been lifted from his shoulders to know that he still had everybody’s unwavering trust.

With a laugh, Claude picked up the game controllers and loaded up a new round of Mario Kart. “OK,” he said, “which one of you wants to die first?” 

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

Marianne and Raphael made it back to Headquarters with ten minutes to spare. Apparently, the traffic had been lenient on them and Marianne’s therapy appointment had started a few minutes earlier than scheduled. Claude was glad that he was able to fill them in on everything briefly before Dimitri’s boys arrived – the last thing he wanted was to cast confusion upon an already sore subject.

Being such a tight-knit team, they didn’t take to intruders well. When Claude had recruited Linhardt and Caspar, the rest of his crew had made their first two months a living nightmare with relentless pranks and playground insults. Even the quiet and reserved Marianne had aided Hilda in filling Caspar’s desk drawers with neon-green slime putty. The poor kid had spent the better part of three days scraping the hardened stuff off of his stationary.

Eventually, the two of them became widely accepted after Linhardt orchestrated a revenge plot that had left them all startled, impressed, and covered in ungodly amounts of glue and glitter. Claude was still finding the stuff in his bathroom, and the two now only had to endure being called ‘newbies’ despite having joined over a year ago.

“I want you all to make our guests feel welcome,” Claude said, addressing the whole team in the living room. “If we hand them back to Dimitri broken, he might dock some of our pay. Understood?”

“Aw, boss,” Hilda whined. “Can’t we have a _little _bit of fun?”

“Yeah!” Caspar added with a furrowed brow and a pout. “I want to be on the other end of the pranks for once.”

Claude paused and mulled it over. He’d love more than anything to let them have their way, but his integrity and reputation were probably at stake and he cared at least enough about those things to see sense and remain undeterred. “If any of you do anything and I find out about it, I’ll be taking it out of _your_ pay.”

“So… as long as we don’t get caught, we’re good?” Lysithea asked and Claude couldn’t argue with that. What he didn’t know couldn’t come back to haunt him, he supposed.

“Yup.”

“_Nice._”

“But you should remember,” Claude narrowed his eyes, “that I am the best detective this world has ever witnessed, and to make any such attempts will put your lives at severe risk.”

Lysithea said nothing, but narrowed her own eyes in return, seemingly accepting the challenge. Claude knew she wouldn’t listen, and a part of him couldn’t wait to see what kinds of horrors she was probably already concocting in that tiny little genius brain of hers. Claude also hoped that maybe the two temps would be unbearably awful so he wouldn’t feel so bad when she inevitably did disobey his orders to unleash chaos upon their unsuspecting heads.

“Do you know anything about them?” Marianne asked. “Their names? What they’re like?”

“I’m afraid not,” Claude said. He hadn’t really cared at the time, determined not to even accept their help in the first place. Claude had argued that they’d probably end up slowing the team down if anything, but Dimitri vouched for them so strongly that Claude could only sigh in defeat. “The only thing Dimitri said of importance was that they were his ‘best men’.”

“I thought he was a business boy, not an army commander.” Leonie straightened her posture and saluted with the voice of a ninety-year-old man,_ “‘These are my best men.”_

Lorenz rolled his eyes from his armchair and crossed one slim leg over the other. “And they say _I’m_ dramatic.”

“But you _are—”_

“Am I _ever_ just allowed to state facts rhetorically?”

“Not under this roof,” Hilda said, and then the door knocked and every head inside Headquarters turned to stare at it as though rampaging dinosaurs were about to burst through it rather than the two newest and terribly unwanted members of the team. Never had a more unsettling silence befallen the team.

“You gonna answer that?” Raphael asked after a beat. “Should _I_ answer it?”

“I think it would be best if I answered it,” Claude said, resigning himself to his fate. He just hoped that these new recruits didn’t try to make their lives harder than they needed to be. This job was already difficult, team infighting was a genuine cause for concern.

The room was silent, save for Claude’s heeled shoes clicking against the uneven cement flooring as he made his way towards the door. He turned around before he reached for the handle to send one last cautionary glare at his team. Claude spent extra time staring in to Lysithea’s soul before throwing the door open with a smile.

“Hello, newbies! Welcome to Team Claude!”


	2. THE NEW RECRUITS.

CHAPTER TWO: CLAUDE

THE NEW RECRUITS

“You call yourselves ‘Team Claude’?”

Claude’s smile faltered ever so slightly as he stared at the new recruits. The one who had spoken had a face that not only made him look as though he ate lemons for a living, but also made him look as though he’d rather be literally _any_ other place on earth than on Claude’s doorstep. That was fine – Claude didn’t exactly want him there either. The other guy didn’t exactly leave a great first impression either; he honest to God _winked_ at Claude the second their eyes met. They looked young – younger than Claude would have expected Dimitri’s ‘best men’ to have been, but then Claude was arguably the most famous and well respected retrieval artist known to Fódlan and he was only twenty-three.

“_No we absolutely do not!”_ came Hilda’s voice from inside the house.

“Ignore Hilda. Team Claude is, and will always be, our official team name.”

“_I’ll kill you, Claude! Don’t think for a second that I won’t!”_

Claude made good on his own advice and ignored Hilda in favour of gesturing inside the house. “Why don’t you come on in and introduce yourselves? We’re definitely all very friendly here, _aren’t we guys_?” Claude said in a voice that he hoped only sounded threatening to his own team.

“Sure,” the taller of the two men said. He had an easy smile, one of those unreadable ones that was almost permanent and probably hid a multitude of troubles. Hilda had once described Claude in that way, back when they’d first started out, back when he’d had so much to prove and so little room to care for other’s opinions. Now that his team had become his family, they’d seen every single smile he had to offer, and it turned out, he had a lot of them.

“I expected your base of operation to be a lot less… ugly than this,” the other man said with a grimace as he walked through the door. Claude turned around to follow them inside and frowned on the building’s behalf. It wasn’t _that_ ugly. Sure it was in dire need of some paint, and there were cobwebs decorating the ceiling corners that had probably been spun during the early 1800s, but it had its own charm. They’d spent two solid years here; Claude had watched the patch of mould near the door grow from just a tiny speck to the monstrosity it had become today with something akin to fondness. They didn’t get to where they were by investing all of their money in to interior decoration – success was all in the equipment and the fast food. At least _his_ floor wasn’t covered in horrifically gaudy blue-and-gold tiles.

“It’s satisfactory enough for what we do,” Claude said with a shrug.

The two new recruits stopped in the centre of the living room, each carrying large suitcases, flawlessly turned out in identical and perfectly tailored suits of expensive navy wool. The suit jackets alone probably cost more than the combined price of both sofas his team were stretched out on, and their dress shoes were likely the most expensive things to ever walk upon the cemented warehouse floor – not counting the laptops Caspar had accidentally kicked off of tables over the years.

Claude watched his team rake their eyes over the pair like a pack of hungry wolves; they were already forming opinions. Leonie had most likely taken an instant dislike to them for their garish gold watches alone.

“You super-secret agents or something?” Caspar broke the silence and looked down at his own clothes. Claude had never enforced a dress-code – not unless the job required it, but Caspar was suddenly pulling at his food-stained hoodie and shredded jean shorts as though he were painfully underdressed.

“Something like that,” the taller of the two said. He sent Caspar a similarly flirtatious wink to the one he’d sent Claude moments ago, and Claude watched his precious newbie’s face explode in to a colourful blush.

“Hey,” Claude scowled. “No flirting with my team, you just got here and Caspar is off limits.”

“Sorry about that, _boss_,” he said, winking at Claude again.

Claude gaped. “Stop winking. What’s wrong with you?”

“A lot of things,” the other man cut in tersely. He stuck out his hand, gold watch glinting under the dim warehouse lights. “Felix Fraldarius,” he said by way of introduction.

“Claude Riegan.” Claude took his hand in a firm shake – they were clammy, he noted, as though he’d been nervously balling them in to fists for a long time. _Interesting,_ Claude thought – Felix certainly didn’t give the impression that many things rattled him, but he supposed that meeting a highly unpredictable group of new people was enough to put anyone out of their comfort zone. “I’m sure the rest of my team will introduce themselves in time.”

“Sylvain Gautier,” the other man said. It looked as though it pained him physically not to embellish the declaration with some kind of charming quip, but he managed it. Claude mentally applauded him for winning his battle so valiantly.

The following silence was heavy. None of his team seemed to want to cooperate or offer Claude any sort of help. Lysithea stared at the both of them as though they carried an undocumented disease, Hilda applied the second coat of polish to her nails and eyed them curiously, Ignatz avoided eye contact altogether, and Linhardt remained unfazed and unconscious. Even Lorenz stayed uncharacteristically quiet - Claude was going to take this betrayal to the grave.

“OK,” Claude said, dramatically sweeping his arms to attract the room’s attention. He hoped he could salvage some of this situation, because Felix already looked as though he was ready to fight, and that would not end well for anyone. “Why don’t you take a seat and we’ll get each other up to speed.”

Felix glanced at the sofas – the only open spaces were between members of Claude’s team and that, for obvious reasons, was not a viable option. “I think we’ll just stand,” he said.

“Why?” Leonie narrowed her eyes. “Think we’re contagious or something?”

Claude winced and hoped Felix wasn’t the type to retaliate so easily. Surely someone who dressed themselves so impeccably and carried themselves like the body guard of the president wouldn’t rise to such a petty challenge.

“Not to worry,” Felix said and Claude let out a sigh of relief. “I made sure to get my shots before coming anywhere near this place.” _Never mind._

“You little fucking—”

“You know what? I’ll just go and get the camping chairs,” Claude said and sent Leonie a look that made her reluctantly end her string of curses. “Hilda, a little help?” Hilda held up her drying finger nails as an excuse. “Lorenz?”

Lorenz acquiesced with a huff and followed Claude out to the storage room. The scene they left behind was eerily quiet, and Claude tried not to think about what would transpire the moment he went beyond hearing distance. It certainly wasn’t shaping up to be the best of starts. He hadn’t dealt with such discord since the initial forming of Team Claude; he’d forgotten how annoying it was.

“Are you sure this is a wise decision, Claude?” Lorenz said as soon as they closed the storage room door behind them. Claude felt around for the light and snapped it on, filling the storage room with a dim and flickering glow of orange light. Claude turned on Lorenz and studied his face – he didn’t appear to be chastising Claude like he usually would upon disagreement. Instead, his features were contorted in to genuine concern. Claude gave him a small smile that he hoped gave the illusion of unwavering confidence. Lorenz seemed to slacken slightly under it, but the doubt didn’t leave his eyes.

“We don’t have much of a choice, Lorenz,” Claude said, turning and pulling boxes out of the way to get to the camping equipment. Dust filled the air in dense, swirling clouds and Claude brought a hand to cover his mouth and nose, coughing away the particles that had found their way to the back of his throat. They were seriously going to have to sort through all this junk before moving – Claude couldn’t even remember getting most of the stuff he was rifling through. Why did they even _have_ three separate versions of Monopoly? “This is the best job we've had in months, and if we have to deal with two uppity rich brats to stay on it, then so be it. I just hope nobody kills each other in the process.”

“That’s exactly what I was concerned about.”

“Hey, don’t worry about it. _I’m_ not worried about it. I know I joked about locking them up earlier, but if the situation _really_ gets out of hand, then I’ll send them on a bunch of fool’s errands to get them out of the way. They seem more brawn than brain, they probably won’t even realise what’s happening.”

“I hope you know what you’re doing,” Lorenz sighed, reaching out to take one of the camping chairs Claude had found. Their hands brushed slightly and it _definitely_ wasn’t intentional on Claude’s part. Not at all.

“When do I ever _not_ know what I’m doing?” Claude yanked the second camping chair from under a heavy pile of duffel bags and Lorenz had to reach over him to stop the bags from toppling over and crushing Claude to death.

“I’m not even going to dignify that with a response,” Lorenz scoffed, pushing the bags back to an upright position. “Actually, yes I am. Acheron.”

Claude turned around and they were face-to-face, confined and pressed together by all the junk in the storage room. If Claude hadn’t been so on edge, he might have enjoyed and appreciated their closeness a lot more. Still, when Lorenz stared down at him with an amused expression, Claude couldn’t help but grin back, despite the tidal wave of embarrassment that came hand-in-hand with the name _Acheron_. “Hey! Acheron was a slippery bastard and you know—”

The sound of glass shattering cut Claude off before he could finish mounting his defence. Lorenz jumped and almost dropped the camping chair he was holding. Claude skirted around Lorenz and burst out of the storage room, shouldering the door open and brandishing his own folded camping chair like a weapon. _Please don’t be the coffee table,_ he pleaded internally. As ugly as it was, it was a gift from his aunt Judith and he’d never hear the last of it if it got destroyed. Not after the Vase Incident.

When Claude happened upon the scene, his heart sank. Felix was still standing with his arms crossed over his chest, but his face was considerably redder than Claude had last seen it, as though he were physically struggling to hold back a thousand-and-one insults. Leonie was also standing, and one of her booted feet had gone through the table, showering the floor with tiny pieces of shattered glass and empty pizza boxes. She was looking sheepishly and apologetically in Claude’s direction, an explanation dancing on the tip of her tongue. Everyone else was tactfully avoiding Claude’s gaze, choosing instead to study the cement floor as though it were suddenly the most interesting thing in the whole world.

Claude couldn’t even pick an emotion to feel. There were too many bubbling within him; exasperation, anger, irritation, dread. He decided to ignore them all and settle for a false sense of calm in the hopes that it might take an actual hold of him.

“Leonie tried to get on the table to threaten Felix and her foot went right through it,” Ignatz said before anyone could breathe, words tumbling out of his mouth in a reflexive action.

“Don’t be a fucking snitch, Ignatz,” Leonie hissed and then turned her scowl on to Felix, lifting her chin to point at him. “He called us mediocre!”

That caught Claude’s attention. If there was one thing he and his team weren’t, it was mediocre. Even Lorenz bristled at his side, letting out a contempt snort. Claude levelled Felix with a look, inviting him to explain himself. He could condone Leonie breaking his table to threaten this sour-faced, top-knot-wearing, expensive-suited know-it-all if it was to defend their honour.

“And I stand by it,” he said. “I haven’t seen anything special here that would warrant such a prodigious reputation or such a high price tag. How you manage to get anything done with this team of untamed ruffians, inside this _hovel _is beyond me.”

“Oh god,” Sylvain said and pointed to the seat next to Hilda. “I don’t want to be a part of this. Can I sit here?” he asked. Hilda considered him and then shrugged assent, shuffling over slightly and pressing herself in to Marianne’s side to make room. Sylvain melted in to the sofa and tried to hide his face behind his hand.

“Your boss hired us. If you have a problem, you can take it up with him. I’m not elated at the prospect of babysitting you either,” Claude said simply. He even managed to smile, in the hope that it might piss Felix off even further.

“Believe me, I already have,” Felix scoffed. “For some unknown reason, the _fool_ seems to actually trust you_._ But we could have handled this without your interference.”

“Oh?” Lorenz said. “And how exactly would you have gone about that? Do tell.” Felix didn’t seem to have a response prepared for such an abrupt interrogation and Lorenz laughed, light and musical at his telling silence. “Just as I thought.”

“Shut up, you pretentious purple fuck.”

“Woah, hey!” Caspar cut in, finally finding something in the conversation worth fighting for and rolling up the sleeves of his hoodie. “Only I can call Lorenz a purple fuck! You want to take this outside?”

“_Nobody’s_ allowed to call Lorenz a purple fuck!” Claude amended, patting Lorenz on the back in solidarity. Lorenz just rolled his eyes. Claude turned to Felix. “Especially not someone who’s only been here a total of five minutes. Listen, you either start cooperating with us like your well-behaved friend here, or we lock you in the storage room until I’m supposed to hand you back over to Dimitri.”

“You wouldn’t,” Felix said snidely. He was right, Claude wouldn’t, but he was hoping that the threat might have convinced Felix to settle down some. Maybe his misconceptions about the team being ‘ruffians’ also made them sound dangerous enough to operate by such means. Even the best security guard couldn’t fight off nine people at once.

“You’re right, _I_ wouldn’t,” Claude verbalised. “But if I were to leave, for say, ten minutes to go and get myself a nice cup of coffee down the street, and left _Hilda_ in charge…”

Hilda grinned wildly. “Ooh! Are we finally going with my torture idea now?”

Sylvain’s eyes widened almost comically and he glanced at Hilda before shuffling as far in to the opposite corner of the sofa as he could manage.

“Hopefully not,” Claude said, holding out a camping chair in Felix’s direction as a peace offering. Felix looked down at it, lips turned downward in distaste as he considered his options. Felix mulled it over for a while and then he snatched it with a huff. With heavy hands, he wiped the chair clean of dust and cobwebs and threw it open, almost breaking it in the process, before sitting down upon the flimsy material with the grace of a mountain troll. Lysithea snorted as she watched the dramatic display, but Claude stepped in before Felix could get riled up again. “OK, now that we’re all acting civilised - Leonie, please get your damned foot out of my aunt’s table.”

“Sorry about that, boss,” she said, retracting her foot from the remaining metalwork frame. The sound of crunching glass as she moved back to her seat made Claude wince, but he decided not to even_ think_ about the mess until they’d finally gotten their investigation under way. They had nothing to prove, but Claude suddenly felt _very_ motivated to show Dimitri’s ‘best men’ just how impressive _his_ team actually was.

Lorenz took his usual seat on one of the vacant armchairs, and Claude opened out the remaining camping chair to sit in view of his entire team. “Ignatz, did you finish that list?”

“Sure did, Claude,” he said, holding out a neatly printed list of names. 

“What’s that?” Sylvain asked.

Claude looked down at the paper – Ignatz had done a spectacular job. There were over thirty names of business dealers, CEOs, and random acquaintances that would prove a definite starting point. “A list of people Dimitri has been in contact with over the last few months. Someone has to have gotten that safe combination out of him somehow – whether it be someone who bugged him or—”

“He wasn’t bugged,” Felix cut in. “We would have known about it. We’re his personal guard. We go everywhere with him. Nobody could have gotten close enough.”

“Uh, hate to break it to you kid,” Claude said, “but odds are, you wouldn’t even realise he was being bugged until it was too late. If _ever_. In fact, it’s still probably lurking under the lapel of one of his fancy suits.”

“You stupid or something? Didn’t you hear what I just said?” Felix snapped. “Nobody has touched Dimitri without our knowing about it in the last two years, and I’m telling you that I probably know every single name on that list and how many meters I kept them clear of him. It’s impossible.”

Claude let out a calming breath. This kid was making it seriously difficult to remain civilised.

“That’s intense,” Caspar said. “Do you watch him shit, too?”

“We escort him to public restrooms, yes,” Felix said, ignoring Caspar’s amused grin. “There was an attempt on his life two years ago. We’d rather not take any chances.”

“An attempt on his life?” Claude raised an eyebrow. He didn’t appreciate being lied to, even if the lies were by omission. “Huh, that’s funny because Dimitri didn’t mention that when I asked him for a list of possible enemies.”

“It was all dealt with years ago,” Sylvain said, waving a hand to dispel the thought. “The only way that person could steal his locket is if they’d also managed to escape prison, which I think we _definitely_ would have heard about by now.”

Claude glanced at Felix – he didn’t seem to be very adept at hiding his true opinions and feelings, so Claude used him to gauge the truth. Felix’s face didn’t betray anything; he looked just as confident in the information as Sylvain. Claude supposed he’d have to take their word for it and hope that no assassination plots started unfurling mid-investigation.

“Um, if I may,” Marianne said, raising a hand. “What kind of safe did you say Mr. Blaidydd was using?”

“A wall safe,” Lorenz said as though he were actually saying the words ‘cat vomit’.

“Ah. Oh.” Marianne looked saddened by the news.

“What’s wrong with that?” Felix asked as though he’d been personally affronted.

“Oh, nothing really,” Marianne said quickly. “It's just that they’re quite easy to break in to. A very determined, and very careless thief, would be able to burn a hole in one rather quickly, or pry the front face clean off with a crowbar. Only, Claude very specifically said that no tools were used, so my guess is that it was the _office_ that was bugged, not Mr. Blaidydd.”

“The office?” Claude said, touching the deer pin on his shirt. He hadn’t even thought to check the office for bugs whilst he’d been there. He was struggling to remember if there _was_ a decent enough place to hide one with the lack of actual furniture inside.

“Yes,” Marianne nodded. “It’s a good thing you wore that, or they’d have heard your entire conversation. That is, if they’ve kept the device on still and haven’t removed it. I can’t see them having a need for it any longer, but it certainly is a possibility.”

After a particularly unfortunate double-cross from a rather unpleasant client a few years back, Lysithea had fashioned Claude a frequency disruptor as an insurance policy of sorts. Dealing with such duplicitous characters meant that Claude needed to protect not only himself, but his team too. The pin rendered any and all devices from phones and radios, to bugs and spy cameras effectively useless as long as Claude was near them and the disruptor was turned on. He used to complain about it, often even forgot to wear it places, but now he was suddenly _very_ glad he’d gotten bored enough in Dimitri’s waiting room to think about switching it on.

“We’d better hope that your boss hasn’t been talking about us in his down time,” Claude said, “or this is going to get a whole lot harder.”

“How so?” Sylvain asked casually, leaning back in his seat and running a hand through his carefully styled shock of orange hair.

“Because,” Claude sighed, “that means whoever has stolen it will be expecting us.” Claude hadn’t encountered such a complex job in all his time as a retrieval artist, but he supposed that would just make it all the more enjoyable when they eventually won. “What makes you think it’s the office, Marianne?”

“Well,” she said, leaning forward and tucking her legs up on to the sofa beneath her. “Since the combination was so long, and the chances of hearing it said aloud are so slim, there’s no way the thief would risk putting the bug on an item of clothing, not unless they’d managed to bug every single suit jacket in Mr. Blaidydd’s collection. I’m not sure you need me to tell you why that would be ridiculous.”

“Not at all,” Claude laughed.

“So, in order to have the best chance at hearing the combination, it would need to be the office that was bugged. A good enough bug would be able to pick up even the slightest of sounds, so the thief, at the very least, would have been able to ascertain exactly how many numbers were in the combination, since a lot of modern day wall safes are electronic and have keypads that make noises when pressed.”

“That’s brilliant,” Sylvain said, watching Marianne speak as though she were reciting emotional poetry.

“Not really,” Hilda cut in, narrowing her eyes at Sylvain and shuffling closer to Marianne. “It got your boss’ locket stolen.”

“Not the _bug_, the—you know what? Never mind.”

“That's right,” Hilda smiled sweetly. "Never mind."

“Hearing some beeps still doesn’t explain how the thief got in to the safe,” Felix said impatiently. “The combination doesn’t get said aloud. Not even Sylvain and I know it.”

“The obvious assumption would be fingerprint powder,” Marianne said. “The buttons that were pressed most recently, and most often, would have shown up brighter under the correct light. From there, depending on the thief’s resources, they could have put the numbers through all kinds of algorithms to create codes, and then it’s just a matter of trying them all out. Of course, with a number that long, the possibilities are almost endless and that isn’t very practical. I believe that fingerprint powder might have been used, but only partially. It’s more likely that the thief had the bug inside the office for a _very_ long time, listening for any and all clues and was eventually able to piece together the combination after obtaining all of the information. I suppose you could say they probably had their fingers in quite a few pies.”

"And a pair of headphones on for a _very_ long time," Claude muttered.

Sylvain let out a low whistle and Hilda beamed at Marianne. “Have I ever told you that I love you?” she said.

“Yes, Hilda,” Marianne smiled. “You told me this morning.”

“Good.”

Claude smiled at her too. Five years ago, when she’d first joined the team, Marianne hadn’t really spoken to anyone other than Claude and Hilda. She’d come a long way since then. Claude was immensely proud of her.

“Sure hope your boss hasn’t been doing the nasty in his office,” Leonie snorted. "Poor thief would have had an earful."

Felix made a disgusted sound and started to protest, but Claude cut him off again to ask Lysithea, “If I got you the bug, could you find out where the signal leads to?”

Lysithea shrugged. “Probably. The parts have to come from_ somewhere_, so even if I can’t get a clear link back to a specific location from the frequency, then I should still be able to determine a generalised area of origination.”

“When Linhardt returns from beyond the grave,” Caspar added, glancing at Linhardt’s undisturbed form on the floor, “he’ll probably be able to do some testing on that fancy card too. He’s good with that forensic shit. I once got him a Valentine’s card that had a spelling error in the little poem thing, and he managed to locate both the original creator and printer of that exact batch of cards just to let them know about their mistake.” Caspar’s chest puffed out with pride. “He also got me a refund too, somehow. It was real cute.”

“Great,” Claude beamed. The meeting had gone even better than he’d hoped - he could always count on his team to fill in the blanks he was drawing. They were a well-oiled machine, parts whirring and working together in practiced motion, ticking continuously like a clock. The thrill of a job never failed to get Claude’s blood pumping and the first few days were usually the most exciting, when plans started forming and things started to come together and make sense. “We’ll get started first thing tomorrow morning. I’ll take the techs, the temps and Marianne back to the Blaidydd building while the rest of you pack everything up to move to our new temporary base of operations.”

“Aw, can’t I come along?” Hilda whined. “I’m too pretty to spend the morning packing up boxes.”

Claude raised an eyebrow. “Hilda, while you are undeniably correct, we both know that you wouldn’t help with the packing anyway. Plus, there’s not enough room in the car. You might as well stay here looking pretty.”

“Well, as long as we’re all clear on that,” she shrugged.

Raphael laughed. “I don’t care, I can lift for the both of us. So long as you supply the coffee and snacks.”

“_That_ I can do.”

“Well then, any objections to our current plan?” Claude asked more to Felix and Sylvain than anyone else. They both fixed him with looks – Sylvain looked impressed, where Felix looked positively explosive. Claude braced himself for the inevitable impact.

“Of course I have objections! You’re telling me that Dimitri’s office has been bugged for _months?_ There’s no way in hell! You all seem to think we’re a pair of incompetent idiots,” he snapped and looked to Sylvain for support. Sylvain just returned him a withering look that screamed ‘_please don’t get me involved’. _

“Your words,” Leonie muttered.

“Shut up,” Felix snarled, leaning forward with a metallic creak of the camping chair. “We’re not that stupid! We check our security cameras daily. I think we’d notice if a thief showed up one day and started hiding bugging devices in the light fixtures.”

Lorenz snorted and then caught himself. “I do apologise,” he said, not looking apologetic in the slightest. “However, you’re making it incredibly difficult for me to take you seriously.”

“What he _means_,” Claude cut in before Felix could call him a ‘pretentious purple fuck’ again, “is that there is a lot about our line of work that you don’t know, and that’s OK. Because it actually works in our favour that people like you _don’t.”_

Felix levelled Claude with a glare that could have rendered him dead had it the capacity to kill. _“People like me?_”

“Security,” Claude clarified.

“Why don’t I give you a little demonstration?” Lysithea said, flipping her laptop open. She didn’t look to Claude for permission, but then it wasn’t as though she needed it - Claude was going to enjoy this.

Nobody liked being shown up, especially not when they thought they were at the top of their game. Claude had come to terms with his lack of knowledge in differing areas of expertise a long time ago. You didn’t become the leader of a renowned retrieval team by thinking you could do it all. Claude couldn’t operate a computer like his tech team could, neither could he infiltrate a building quite like Lorenz. His own talents lied in planning, leading, and talking - he was well aware of that, and it had taken a long time for him to realise it when he’d first started out as a team leader. He’d been so used to doing everything by himself that trust didn’t come easy. But now, Team Claude was the go-to name for retrievals, and they had built their empire together in an alliance of mutual trust and respect.

But for people like Felix who had been told constantly that they were the very best at what they did, who had never been challenged in such a way or suffered crushing defeat – it was hard to accept that someone might just know more than you. Claude could see that Felix was definitely a competent guard – was probably able to take down just about every possible threat that could be thrown at his boss, and had most likely been vital and instrumental in the detaining of Dimitri’s supposed assassin. But _this_ was something completely out of his hands and he wasn’t enjoying it in the slightest.

Sometimes people were like puzzles. Like a safe combination to crack, or a building blueprint to learn; to get to know how a person ticks, you must first get to know the person. But after only knowing Felix for a short amount of time, Claude was confident that he’d already managed to work him out. And in order for Felix to start trusting his team, to start respecting them, to stop doubting their talents, and taking everything as a personal attack, he needed to be shown just how out of his depth he actually was here.

Lysithea moved from her seat on the sofa and tip-toed over the scattered glass to settle herself on the floor between Claude and Felix’s camping chairs. She sat cross legged and balanced her laptop on top of her knees as she tapped in her password.

“What exactly are you doing?” Felix asked, impatience clear in his voice. Claude caught Lorenz’s eye and they shared a knowing smile.

“Patience, angry one,” she hushed him, fingers flying over the keys as she started performing her magic. Claude had a vague idea of what she was about to do, had seen Lysithea perform it multiple times during jobs with absolute fascination. Claude could type fast – it was impossible to grow up in the technological age without becoming somewhat adept with computers - but watching Lysithea always made him feel as though he performed at a snail’s pace when compared.

Felix watched the images on her screen flashing by with a confused frown; Claude couldn’t help but wonder if he was even able to smile at all. Maybe Sylvain smiled enough for the both of them.

“Ha! That was _easy_,” Lysithea snorted. “You’d think with all that money they’d have set up a more secure system. Rich people really don’t have a clue. They think they can just throw in some cheap cameras, install some anti-virus software, and be on their way. But it’s actually more like they’ve just put up a huge neon sign that says ‘_please rob me, I’m stupid’_.”

“Wait!” Felix stood abruptly and pointed at the laptop screen as though he were about to cry ‘witchcraft!’ and call upon an angry mob of townspeople. “That’s our building!”

“Yes. It is,” Lysithea grinned. “And this,” she said, tapping a number on her keyboard, “is your boss’s office. Oh look, it’s empty. He must have gone home.” Claude watched her cycle through the security cameras with bored nonchalance, each tap of the keys sending her to a different part of the building.

“It’s a rather ugly inside, isn’t it?” Ignatz piped up from where he was sitting. He was showing his own laptop, that he’d mirrored Lysithea’s actions upon, to Raphael and Leonie. “Could do with some serious redecorating.”

“That was my first thought,” Claude agreed, grimacing upon the memory of the ugly tiled floor. “Hey, flick over to Dimitri’s reception area and tell me what you think the floor pattern is supposed to be. I couldn’t work it out.”

The team all crowded around Ignatz’s laptop, and Claude continued to peer over Lysithea’s shoulder as they simultaneously brought up the CCTV feed for the tenth floor reception. The height and angle of the camera did nothing to make the picture any clearer. Nine heads tilted in unison as they tried to work out the floor tile puzzle.

“It looks like a bunch of flowers,” Marianne said.

Hilda shook her head. “I don’t know, Mari. It kinda looks like a monster. Those are definitely teeth.”

“It’s a lion,” Sylvain said. At some point, curiosity had gotten the better of him and he had forgone his place on the sofa to rest his hands on Felix’s shoulders and watch what was transpiring on Lysithea’s laptop. He didn’t seem to be as outraged by Lysithea’s hacking prowess as Felix obviously was. He actually seemed quite amused.

“A lion?” Claude couldn’t see it. Not even when he turned his head almost entirely upside down.

“Yeah, it’s Dimitri’s—”

Felix made a noise that was caught between anger and disgust. “It doesn’t matter what the fuck it is. How did you do that?”

“It was easy,” Lysithea shrugged. “Most buildings operate with wireless CCTV set-ups these days. Without the correct protection, they’re one of the easiest things to hack in the world – just a few codes and bam! You’re in.”

“And it’s just as easy to patch in a feed of your own, or loop the current feed to make it appear as though all is clear,” Ignatz added. “Your thief could very easily have done what Lysithea just did – it’s one of the most basic tools under a hacker’s belt.”

Lysithea’s smile was vicious. “Do you see now that not everything is as it seems? You haven’t _seen_ anything out of the ordinary, because the thief didn’t _want_ you to.”

“Huh,” Sylvain leaned back and settled a hand on his hip. “Sure wish we’d known _that_ two years ago. That’s pretty cool.”

“It’s quite the handy tool,” Claude agreed. “Just as good for a thief as it is for _mediocre_ retrieval artists like us. Security guards don’t tend to think such things are possible, and with a building as large and empty as yours, it would be even easier to maintain the façade of an empty corridor. It’s not your fault you can’t see ghosts,” Claude added. “As I said to your boss, your thief was _very_ determined to take the locket. I don’t think there was much you could have done to prevent the outcome.”

“It’s illegal and cowardly is what it is.” Felix huffed and crossed his arms over his chest. He didn’t look happy, but he also didn’t say anything more on the subject, so Claude took it as a small victory. It was quickly seeming as though this entire job was going to measure along in small victories. Claude would take them wherever he could get them.

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

It wasn’t until late evening started to creep in that Claude was able to catch his breath. He dug the heels of his palms in to his eyes as he sat in front of his computer, hoping to rid himself of the strain and ache that was creeping in behind them. He was at least glad to find that not much in the way of rivalry or violence had transpired since their meeting – Felix and Sylvain had generally stuck to their own little area of the warehouse, interacting as little with the rest of the team as they could manage. From what Claude could gather from Sylvain’s forlorn glances in the direction of the sofas however, it definitely wasn’t _his _idea.

Team Claude didn’t seem to like the two of them in the slightest – not that Claude could blame them. Felix seemed determined to voice his disdain for them quite vocally from his claimed corner, and no amount of Sylvain hissing and shushing seemed to get him to calm down. But more so than the insults, Claude knew the team was pissed at Felix’s lack of respect for them. They’d worked hard to get where they were today – had retrieved more prized items and circumvented more high-profile thefts than Felix probably realised, but he’d never know that. That would require him to not only do his research, but also place value on them and their work.

Claude couldn’t lie and say he held any kind of special feeling towards the duo either – the sooner they got rid of them, the better. He couldn’t, however, deny that everything would run that little bit smoother if everyone just shut up and got along. There were so many questions he needed to ask them, to ask Felix in particular, but both sides of the room were avoiding each other as though they had the plague, and Claude wasn’t elated by the prospect of enduring another round of insults just to learn more about the supposed assassination attempt. He’d have to do some digging of his own when he had the time.

Claude made some calls and organised moving trucks to pick up their stuff late next morning, while the more active members of the team made a start on packing boxes and safely untangling the monstrous heap of wires in the tech office. All that was left for him to do now, was to make the final preparations and payments for their new temporary residence in Myrddin. It would see them through the job until Claude could receive the final payment from Dimitri and secure Hilda’s dream residence in Garreg Mach. He was loathe to admit it, but it was at least a lot cleaner and more practical than their current house. Ignatz would definitely be thrilled to find out that the plug sockets weren’t at risk of succumbing to dampened mould or dangerously close to starting a fire, not to mention that it also had an upstairs with a few bedrooms so Linhardt didn’t have to sleep on the cold cement floor when he eventually burned out.

Hilda had asked if they even still needed to move at all, but after hearing about Dimitri’s bugged office, Claude only became more resolute in his decision to leave Ailell behind. It was unlikely that anyone would move to physically attack them, but a threatened thief was not above tipping off the police and sending hordes of authority raining down upon them, nor were they unlikely to try bugging _their_ residence either. The last thing Claude wanted was to broadcast their plans to god knows who before they’d even finalised them. To fall for the schemes Claude had been warning the new temps about would be nothing short of humiliating.

When Claude finally powered down his computer and dragged his tired body back in to the living room, his team was huddled on the sofas again, relaying food orders to Lorenz who was trying to make sense of it all before phoning it through.

“Will you be wanting anything, Claude?” Lorenz asked, looking up with his pen poised hesitantly over his scrap of order paper.

“I’m starving,” Claude groaned, falling down in to the hard cushions next to Lysithea. She didn’t even look up from what she was typing, not even when Claude’s fall jostled her laptop and almost sent it flying to the floor. “I’ll have whatever Raph’s having.”

Raphael gave a hearty cheer and sent Claude a thumbs up. “Good man! We’ll be eating like kings!”

Lorenz looked down at his list and then back at Claude with a raised eyebrow. “Are you sure about that?”

He would probably regret the decision when the food arrived, but as of right now, his stomach was making all of his executive decisions. “Absolutely. What about the temps? Have they ordered?”

“We attempted to establish contact, but Tweedledum and Tweedledee are going _out_ to eat, apparently,” Lorenz shrugged and twirled the pen artfully around his fingers.

“_I’d rather die than succumb myself to that kind of torture,_” Caspar said in an uncannily precise Felix imitation. He scowled in their direction, making no effort to lower his voice knowing that they could probably hear his every word. “I don’t get them. Lorenz orders his fancy people food alongside ours just fine. It’s like they think they’re too good to even be near us.”

Marianne looked up from where she was braiding Hilda’s hair. “I imagine it might take them a while to adjust. We are unfamiliar after all.”

“Nah, I reckon they’re just scared,” Leonie said. “I mean if _I_ met me I’d probably be intimidated.”

“Yeah, I guess it didn’t really help that you put your foot through my table. I can’t even _begin_ to imagine why they might not want to sit with us,” Claude laughed. He kept his assumptions about it being more to do with Felix’s pride than anything else to himself, lest he open another can of argumentative worms.

Leonie winced. “Shit. I said I was sorry about that.”

“It’s fine. But you’re dealing with Judith when she comes around and asks where her house warming gift went.”

The threat didn’t have the desired effect – instead of blanching, Leonie just beamed and fanned herself with her hand. “That’s fine by me, boss.”

“Aw, Leonie, gross. Don’t do that, she’s my aunt.” While Judith wasn’t his biological aunt, she was close enough for Claude to still feel as though his entire existence was collapsing in on itself with every suggestive eyebrow raise Leonie sent his way.

“Not my fault she’s an AILF,” Leonie shrugged. Hilda cackled when Claude’s face dropped in to a mournful grimace.

“What’s an AILF?” Raphael looked quizzically at Leonie, mouth moving silently as he tried to work out the acronym himself with little success.

“Aunt I’d Like to—”

“Leonie, _please.”_

“Fine, fine. Can we just phone the order through now? I’m so hungry I could probably eat the sofa.”

Ignatz made a strangled sound. “Please don’t! Goodness knows what kinds of diseases exist inside that cushion foam. You’d probably become patient zero for the zombie apocalypse and I don’t like my chances of getting out of here alive. You'd probably make the most ripped group of zombies ever.”

“Like hell I would. I’d never let myself get infected.”

“I don’t think you’d have much of a choice, Leo,” Marianne frowned. “Disease doesn’t exactly care how big your muscles are.”

Leonie flexed her biceps like a contestant in a muscle competition. “It’ll care when it meets mine."

“That’s true,” Raphael nodded. “I haven’t suffered from the flu since I lifted my first set of weights.”

Marianne looked flummoxed, but before any further discussion could be made, Sylvain broke from Felix’s side to join their side of the room. Like a harbinger of death, his presence befell the team with silence, and their smiles melted in to indifferent neutrality. “Sorry to interrupt such, uh, _important_ discussions,” he said awkwardly, looking over his shoulder to glance at Felix. “But, we’re heading out now. We’ll be staying overnight in a hotel nearby so we probably won’t see you until the morning.”

Claude couldn’t help but laugh. It was like being back at school, sending messengers across the canteen to quiz a long-time crush on whether or not they fancied you. “That’s fine. Sweet dreams and all that good stuff,” Claude said amicably. “Get all the rest you can; from tomorrow onwards, we’ll be doing lots of late nights. You should also call Dimitri when you have the chance, tell him we’ll be stopping by and warn him not to speak a word inside his office until we get there, just in case. We’ll meet you outside the Blaidydd building at nine a.m.”

“Will do,” he said, and then glanced over his shoulder again before leaning down and lowering his voice. “Sorry about Felix. He’s just a bit… cautious around new people, that’s all. He’ll warm up to you all eventually.”

“Hey, Mr. Gautier,” Hilda said, beckoning him towards her with a curled finger and a whisper. He perked up and crouched down near where she was sitting between Marianne’s legs on the floor, still having her hair twisted in to and intricately braided bun. When he was close enough, she whispered loudly for the team to hear, “We don’t really give a fuck what Felix thinks about us.”

Sylvain smiled, but Claude could tell it wasn’t a happy one. “Of course,” he cleared his throat and turned back to Claude. “Tomorrow then?”

“Tomorrow,” Claude saluted.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aaa thank you all so much for reading and for your lovely comments! i hope you enjoyed this installment :D


	3. GETTING STARTED.

CHAPTER THREE: CLAUDE

GETTING STARTED

“We all buckled in, kids?” Claude asked over his shoulder. Lysithea, Linhardt and Ignatz were cramped in the back of the car, arguing over whose seatbelt buckle was whose. Or rather, Lysithea and Linhardt were arguing. Ignatz, the perpetual angel, was already doodling on his tablet, expertly ignoring the commotion with his earphones tucked snugly in his ears. “I’ll take that as an ‘almost’.”

It was a good forty minute drive to the Blaidydd building from their residence in Aillel. Claude was glad he at least had Marianne riding shotgun to keep him in good company. Lysithea and Linhardt were fun to talk to individually, but together, they often got lost in a language Claude couldn’t even begin to understand. Trying to keep pace with their conversations often felt more like trying to keep up with a professional athlete in a marathon.

Claude was also glad to note that Linhardt no longer looked as though he was knocking on death’s door. Apparently, Linhardt had finished the creation and development of a new app that was going to help them immensely in their upcoming reconnaissance missions. Claude was eager to find out exactly what Linhardt had deemed worthy of incapacitating himself for; he’d certainly timed it well at least.

When they finally got on the road, the arguing ceased and Claude decided to take advantage of the long strip of uneventful road and his team’s alertness to pick their brains. Some of his best ideas and breakthroughs came from idle chatter. “The name Flame Emperor mean anything to you nerds?” he asked.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Lysithea asked, fiddling with the roll-down window. When she rolled it down far enough, a strong gust of wind hit and covered her face in a tangled mess of her own white hair. Claude resisted the urge to comment on how it made her look like a ghost-child – he knew she definitely wouldn’t appreciate the comparison.

“Was Hilda on the money when she said the name sounded like a video game character?”

“You play just as many video games as the rest of us, Claude,” Linhardt said. “If you don’t recognise it, then neither do we.”

“I don’t play _that _many—OK, well, maybe I do.” Claude winced when he thought back to the fifty-two hours he’d already put in to his newest strategy PC game endeavour over the weekend. “I guess what I’m suggesting, is that you two are arguably better versed in the intricacies of video game lore than I am.”

Linhardt raised an unimpressed brow – he wasn’t convinced, but he indulged Claude nonetheless. “I don’t recognise it at all. In fact, when Caspar filled me in this morning, my curiosity got the better of me and I performed a surface-level search on the name.”

“Oh? Nice,” Claude smiled. “Anything?”

“Not unless our thief is either extremely interested in ancient history, or they’re a Yu-Gi-Oh! fanatic.”

“How does everything always manage to come back around to Yu-Gi-Oh! somehow?” Claude muttered.

“There _does_ seem to be a card for pretty much any combination of words you can think of,” Linhardt agreed. “But I think it would be safe to assume that ‘Flame Emperor’ is just a name of their own devising. Once we get set up in the new building though, I’ll perform a more comprehensive check of all uses of the name in the last ten years to be sure.”

“Hey, you’re not gonna overwork yourself again are you, Lin? I don’t want to find you passed out on the floor for the third time this month.”

“If I say no, will you believe me and let me do what I want anyway?”

Claude thought about it. “Probably.”

“Then no, I’m not going to pass out or whatever.”

“Cool. Then in that case, could you also do a background check on Dimitri?” Claude asked.

“I’d like nothing more.” Claude could see Linhardt’s small smile in the rear view mirror. “May I ask for your reasoning?”

“I don’t like being kept in the dark about things.” Claude narrowed his eyes at the road stretching on endlessly ahead of him. Hearing about Dimitri’s brush with death had definitely shaken things up. Whether Dimitri considered it related or not, Claude needed to know things of that nature _before_ accepting jobs. Getting his team involved with someone potentially dangerous was _not_ how Claude liked to operate; safety was always paramount. Claude tapped his fingers restlessly against the steering wheel. “I want to know if there’s anything else he’s hiding from us.”

“What, you mean other than two shit-for-brain security guards?” Lysithea grumbled.

“Language, kiddo,” Claude chastised. Lysithea tried to reach over to hit Claude in the back of the head, but Ignatz came to his rescue, blocking the punch and mumbling something about not wanting to die when they were going sixty on a motorway.

“I’m sure they’re not that bad once you get to know them,” Marianne tried. “Sylvain at least seems as though he’s _trying _to get along with us.”

“Yeah,” Claude laughed, “but Felix has him wrapped around his little finger. We’d have better luck trying to befriend a wild goose. It doesn’t matter anyway. Contrary to Dimitri’s belief, we don’t actually _need_ them to get his locket back. Sure their cooperation would be appreciated, but that’s not looking likely. We’ve worked around cases like this before, we can do it again.”

“Does that mean you’re going to lift the prank ban?”

“No, Lys, that does not mean I’m going to lift the prank ban. I’d like to keep all of my bones in the correct amount of pieces.”

“You really think _Felix_ could beat _you_ up? He looks like he weighs, like, ten pounds soaking wet.”

“I don’t doubt for a second that he could,” Claude said. “He’s the personal guard of one of Fódlan’s richest men. You don’t get a position like that without some serious training.”

“Yeah, but you’re way smarter,” Lysithea said.

“Not to mention you have the height advantage,” Linhardt added.

“While I appreciate your compliments and the startling amount of faith you’ve placed in me,” Claude chuckled, “I doubt that my half-assed self-defence training will stand that tall in the face of the world’s angriest bouncer. And I don’t think he’d be so kind as to settle his gripes with a game of chess.”

Lysithea rolled her window back up and slumped in her seat. “I don’t like it when people call us mediocre,” she said quietly. Claude knew that. Knew that Lysithea had worked harder than anyone else to get to the level of intelligence she had today – she’d poured everything in to her work, not even sure she’d live long enough to see the fruits of her labour ripen. But she had, and Claude would be damned if he’d let anyone question her ability.

“Don’t worry, Lys. Felix will eat his words when we throw his stupid locket back in his face and send him packing. Tell you what, I’ll let you prank them when the job’s done and they’re on their way out, how’s that?”

“Really?”

“Course I will! On my honour.”

Lysithea seemed pleased with the deal, and the tone of conversation lightened to trivial chatter about their new residence as well as what breakfast they were going to pick up on the way to the office. Eventually, Lysithea and Linhardt fell in to a deep conversation about Linhardt’s new app, and Claude chatted to Marianne about her progress with her therapist – she was doing well, the woman was nice enough and Marianne liked her voice.

They parked up when they found an overpriced café to breakfast in; it proved near impossible to find somewhere cheaper to pick up a snack in this area of the city. They had another twenty minutes to kill before meeting with the temps at the Blaidydd building, so Claude allowed himself to splash out and ended up treating everyone to a round of horrifically priced miniature cakes and fruit tea. It only took a few minutes for him to regret the decision when they sat down with their plates and it looked as though they were attending a child’s tea party.

Ignatz poked at his penny-sized cheesecake with a forlorn expression. “I thought the more you paid, the bigger the food was supposed to be.”

“You’d think,” Claude grimaced, thinking about how much of a dent the pathetic offering of cake had made in his wallet. It didn’t even taste that much more spectacular than the muffin he’d bought from the run-down bakery on his street a few days ago. “I’m suddenly glad I ate enough food to last me four months last night, because this certainly wouldn’t have seen me through to dinner.”

At least the café was furnished nicely. It had a distinctly antique vibe - though no piece of furniture looked as though it was actually made more than five years ago. The paintings were nice to look at too, and the whole room smelled of freshly baked bread. Claude kept telling himself that the atmosphere and ambiance made up for the steep price tag.

“I’ve never been to Fhirdiad before,” Marianne said, glancing out of the window. “I wasn’t aware it was such a wealthy city.”

Linhardt sipped his tea and copied her, watching the busy city flutter by. “Only the best for His Highness, I suppose.”

“That’s the building right there,” Claude said to Marianne, pointing to the high-rise building a few streets away. It was formidable even from their distance, like a fortress made of blue-tinted glass.

Marianne hummed and studied it quietly, her retrieval-trained eyes no doubt searching it for surface-level clues. “Well the thief certainly didn’t climb in through the window.”

“No,” Claude chuckled. “I don’t think so. Not unless our thief is actually a large amount of geckos hiding in a human suit.”

Ignatz choked slightly on his apple juice. “That’s… actually really unsettling.”

“It wouldn’t be the weirdest thing to ever happen to us,” Linhardt shrugged, and then a dangerous smile tugged at the corner of his lips. “Remember when Acheron—”

“Oh, god, please, no. That’s the second time someone’s tried to bring up Acheron in the past twenty-four hours. I don’t want to even _think_ about that case.”

Marianne looked pale. “No, I think that would be for the best.”

Lysithea narrowed her eyes and pushed her empty plate to the middle of the table. “One day, you’ll actually tell me what happened inside that room, Claude. I don’t know what you have over Caspar and Leonie and how you’ve managed to keep them quiet all this time, but I_ will_ find out.”

“Keep dreaming, kid. It’s never gonna happen. You’d have enough embarrassing leverage over me to last eight lifetimes—Oh, would you look at the time! We’d better get going. Don’t want to keep our new friends waiting.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

Felix and Sylvain were already waiting outside the building when Team Claude showed up two minutes later than the agreed time. Claude definitely didn’t drive as slowly as he could possibly manage just to entertain the idea of Felix tapping his expensively dressed foot against the curb and cursing Claude’s name.

“You’re late,” Felix said the second they were within earshot.

“Yes, good morning to you too, sunshine,” Claude breezed by him and led the way inside, ignoring the grumble of dissent and the subsequent mumble of Sylvain’s hushing.

The ground-floor reception area was just as empty as the rest of the building; it seemed as though the only people who ever set foot inside were eternally bored-looking staff members and retrieval artists. All of the grandeur and opulence inside, however, was wasted on Team Claude – they’d probably find a vomit stain on the floor outside more interesting than the building’s wealthy displays of architecture. Maybe he should have brought Lorenz along for the fun of it.

Claude made a beeline for the elevator and held the doors open for everyone to fit inside. There was plenty of room for all of them to fit comfortably – the elevator was bigger than Claude remembered his first apartment being, but Felix still took one look at the interior and the people inside it and said with a curled lip, “We’ll take the next one.”

“Shut the fuck up and get in, we’re not waiting for you because you want to be a petty baby,” Lysithea spat.

Their staring death match went on for what felt like forever before Sylvain gave up and nudged Felix forward. “Just get inside, Fe,” he sighed. Felix looked as though he’d just experienced a betrayal of the highest degree, but fell in to the elevator nonetheless, quietly fuming.

Sylvain stood between the team and Felix as a buffer of sorts, offering an apologetic smile as he reached over Claude to press the button for the twentieth floor. Claude couldn’t help but think he and Sylvain might have gotten along well had the circumstances of their meeting been different. He was definitely an interesting character – Claude still couldn’t quite work him out. Behind his smile, Sylvain reminded Claude of a box puzzle, where every small victory led to another smaller, yet no less complicated puzzle to crack.

Soft music made the ride skyward a pleasant one. Claude bobbed his head to the calming classical melody, ignoring the glare battle being fought on either side of him. Claude did, however, keep an eye on the wall of reflective gold metal in front of him for any sign of escalating tension. Because as much as he would have liked to watch Lysithea tear Felix’s face off like a feral cat, he _did_ have a duty to ensure that no harm came to Dimitri’s guards. Sylvain seemed to mirror Claude’s sentiment, and kept his hand firmly on Felix’s shoulder as though physically holding him back. Claude caught the eye of Sylvain’s reflection and winked.

“What?” Felix turned and hissed at Sylvain upon hearing his soft chuckle.

“Nothing,” Sylvain smirked, and then gestured at the elevator doors as they opened out on to the twentieth floor’s ugly reception area.

“I definitely don’t see a lion,” Claude mumbled as they made their way across the tiles. Linhardt looked puzzled at his quip, having been asleep during their reception area slating the night before, and turned around as he walked, tilting his head to the side to try and make sense of it.

“Looks more like someone threw up multiple cans of paint,” he surmised around a yawn.

“Morning, Olivia,” Sylvain nodded at the receptionist that had seen Claude through the day before, and Claude watched her cheeks turn pink as she tucked her hair behind her ear and buzzed them through.

“Disruptor.” Lysithea nudged Claude’s arm as they approached Dimitri’s door.

“Oh, yeah.” With a small _click_, Claude turned on the disruptor hidden behind the small deer pin on his chest. “Your phones probably aren’t going to work for a while,” Claude warned. Felix grunted in acknowledgement and knocked hard and fast on Dimitri’s door. He didn’t even wait for the reply to come – he just threw it open and led the charge inside, stomping over to the window, ignoring Dimitri entirely.

Claude raised his eyebrows at Sylvain who just sighed and said, “Don’t ask.”

Sylvain looked tired enough to deserve that small mercy, so Claude granted it to him and led his own team inside Dimitri’s office. Interestingly enough, everything was exactly as he had left it the day before, right down to the moved bookcase and open safe – Claude had half expected the office to have been turned upside down by now. Employers tended to start acting a little irrationally by this point, especially when they were made aware that their privacy had been breached by God knows who.

“Morning, Your Princeliness,” Claude said, watching in amusement as Felix scowled at the Fhirdiad skyline. “I assume your boys have filled you in on everything?”

Dimitri looked at Felix like he was a bomb dangerously close to exploding; he’d obviously had _quite_ the conversation over the phone last night. Claude would have loved to have been a fly on _that_ wall. “Yes,” he said, “they, ah, told me all about the…uh…”

“It’s OK,” Claude said, “you can say bug. I’m jamming any and all frequencies inside this room. They wouldn’t be able to hear us unless they were hiding up in your vents.” Dimitri blanched and looked up at the ceiling. “Which they’re not,” Claude clarified. “Though, it would make things a hell of a lot easier if they were.”

“You’re sure then?” Dimitri asked. “You’re sure the office is--is _bugged_?”

“Marianne here says it’s the only plausible explanation for how you got your safe busted. And,” Claude added with a smile, “I’d trust Marianne with my life.” At the mention of her name, Marianne gave Dimitri a calm smile and a wave. If _that _didn’t instill Dimitri with faith his safe whisperer, Claude wasn’t sure anything ever would.

“Right then.” Dimitri swallowed and looked around hesitantly. “I suppose it would be better for me to just step outside for a moment and leave you to it.” Claude shrugged – it wouldn’t matter either way, but it would probably be better for his team to work without the pressure of Dimitri’s anxiety hanging over them. Dimitri turned to the window and cleared his throat. “Felix, a word?”

“Would you like me to accompany you?” Dedue asked from his place beside the bookcase. He looked concerned, gaze flickering from Felix to Dimitri as they fixed each other with loaded stares - Claude felt suddenly as though he were observing a pivotal scene from an intense TV drama. He turned his head away in a gesture of politeness, faking interest in the room’s surroundings, but kept his ear trained on the conversation to indulge his curiosity.

Felix barked out a harsh laugh and Claude caught sight of Dimitri’s posture straightening as he said, “No that’s fine, thank you, Dedue. We’ll just be in the office next door.”

The door slammed behind Felix as he followed Dimitri out. Sylvain winced and shared a look of exasperation with Dedue that told Claude this had been a long time coming. He hoped sound travelled through walls well enough for him to catch some of their impending argument. It would certainly provide some entertainment for the tedious search that was about to unfold.

“As fun as watching this little drama unfold is,” Claude said. “I would like to try and find the bug _today._ So, if everyone could pick a corner of the room and start looking, that would be great.”

Sylvain chuckled and watched Team Claude disperse to various areas of the room, beginning the search with practiced efficiency. “What exactly am I looking for?”

Lysithea, who had claimed the desk with Ignatz and was already taking apart the phone, looked up. “A little round device. About this big,” she held her fingers apart to the size of a pea. “It could be inside anything; a light fixture, a book, a plant.”

“A _book_?” Sylvain paled, looking at the large bookcase of over two-hundred books with genuine fear in his eyes.

“Better get started, rookie,” Claude grinned. “Unless you want to go digging through the plant soil instead?”

Sylvain glanced at his shirt. He’d forgone the suit jacket on account of the slightly warmer-than-average weather, and decided that it wasn’t worth getting covered in mud just to make the job slightly easier. “I think I’ll stick with the books,” he said.

“Suit yourself,” Claude said and turned to Marianne. “Mari, have a look at the safe, see if you can find anything out of the ordinary that I might have missed. Wear your gloves though, because once you’re done, Linhardt will test it for any residual forensic evidence that might have been left behind.”

“Forensic evidence? Isn’t that, like, police work?” Sylvain paused his search through his book to ask Linhardt, wonderment clear in his voice.

“I did a forensic apprenticeship for a while after university. The hours weren’t very flexible though, and I got bored,” he shrugged. “But Claude lets me do whatever I want.”

“Within reason, of course,” Claude added with a weak laugh, noting Dedue’s concerned look. “Nothing frighteningly illegal. Right, Lin?”

“Oh, uh, yeah. Of course,” Linhardt said flippantly, tying his long hair back and setting his small forensic case on the table. Claude winced. He could have at least _tried_ to sound convincing.

A loud _bang_ from the office next door caught everyone’s attention. Dedue’s head immediately snapped around to the door and he went for it, but Sylvain held him back with a hand on the shoulder and a shake of his head. “Let them get it all out.” Dedue waited for another sound to prove Sylvain wrong and give himself an excuse to throw Felix out of a window, but all was silent and he acquiesced reluctantly, keeping near the door.

To the sound of a rustling office, Claude begrudgingly took up the search of Dimitri’s plant – it was well kept for someone that didn’t seem to care much for personal possessions. He ran his hands along the expanse of each and every leaf, and then carefully lifted and searched the backs for any metallic additions. When he didn’t find anything, Claude turned his attention to the tall stem and searched it similarly for protrusions, cuts, or dents. Nothing. Claude made a face at the pot of soil that the plant sat in. “Uh, you got anything I can sift through this dirt in? I don’t really want to get it all over your boss’ floor,” Claude said to Dedue.

“Don’t worry about it,” Dedue said, uncrossing his arms from his chest to wave him off. “I’d rather you do the job thoroughly and make a mess. Mr. Blaidydd has already moved offices temporarily and won’t be moving back in here until it’s been thoroughly cleaned anyway.”

“Right. Well, if you insist.” He sent a silent apology to the cleaners and thanked his past self for not wearing his best trousers. Marianne threw him a spare pair of gloves that Claude gratefully accepted and pulled on before he began shovelling handfuls of dirt on to the pristine white floor. Claude spread each handful out, separating large chunks of soil by sifting them through his gloved fingers. It was unlikely that a bug would work buried down deep in a plant pot of that size, especially not when it got watered so often, but Claude wasn’t taking any chances. Not with this thief.

Marianne crouched down next to him a while later. “I can’t find anything out of the ordinary with the safe,” she said. “I’m not sure whether that’s a positive or negative at this point, but I’ll hand it over to Linhardt.”

“Thanks, Mari. If you’re curious and want to check anything else, go on ahead. I’ll just be playing with this dirt, here.”

Marianne laughed softly and patted Claude on the shoulder. “I think I’ve answered all of my own most pressing questions. But I would like to see what Ignatz makes of the possible infiltration route,” she said, looking around. “There don’t seem to be many points of entry, save for the vents, and I know Lorenz likes to complain about how difficult climbing them is.”

“I don’t think they used the vents,” Claude shrugged. “This reeks of a walk in, walk out job. The bug probably told them when the office was empty and they hacked the cameras for invisibility. Hey, Sylvain,” Claude called over his shoulder. When Sylvain perked up and gave him his attention, Claude continued, “How much security usually stays here over night?”

“Uh, none?” he said, more a question than an answer. “Unless Dimitri is here, in which case, Felix, Dedue and I will always be nearby.”

“Dimitri doesn’t like to make his staff work unreasonable hours, and there’s nothing here of high enough importance or value to employ a whole night guard,” Dedue added.

“Except your locket,” Claude reminded him.

“Except the locket,” Dedue sighed. “We were under the impression it was securely guarded not only by our secrecy, but also the safe. We were wrong, obviously.”

Claude had thought the most difficult thing about this case would have been working out the method of extraction, but everything just kept falling in to place around him like a puzzle meant for toddlers. Claude could only wish that his own retrieval heists were as straightforward. Now only the '_who' _and '_where' _remained.

“Only slightly,” Claude grimaced and then looked back to Marianne. “See? The thief could have danced all the way down the corridor, taken the whole safe out of the wall and waltzed back out. They made the heist appear more difficult than it actually was. No offence,” Claude added, holding up his muddied hands in Dedue’s direction.

“None taken,” Dedue sighed. “I’ve been working on tightening security in secret for a while, but Dimitri’s not keen on the idea. He says he already has all the security he needs.”

“That’s sweet,” Lysithea cooed, holding a piece of black plastic from the phone receiver up to the window’s light to peer through it. She threw it back down on the desk when she found it clear and reached for another piece. “But stupid.”

Sylvain laughed and shook his head, leafing through his book with a small smile. “That’s Dimitri. Always been too kind for his own good.”

Claude would have called that admirable, but Dimitri was the one now forking out hundreds of thousands of pounds just to get his precious heirloom back. Trust was only valuable when placed in the correct people after all.

By the time Ignatz called out, “I’ve found it!” the plant pot was half empty and the floor looked more like a garden. Claude sighed at the damp pile of soil before throwing it haphazardly back in to the pot and jumping to his feet. He shook the excess dirt off of his gloves and peeled them off, glad to feel air on his sweaty palms once more.

Sylvain snapped what must have been his hundredth book shut and groaned, “Thank _god_.”

Ignatz was lying under Dimitri’s desk like a car mechanic, holding his hand out to the side, brandishing a small round device. He closed his palm again to shimmy back out and then placed it on the desk in front of Lysithea. "What do you think?" he asked, readjusting his glasses.

“This looks pretty strong,” Lysithea mused, picking up the tiny device to get a closer look. “It’s pretty high tech. A signal this strong could even reach as far as Adrestria.”

“I can’t believe it’s still here.” Linhardt raised an eyebrow from where he was investigating the safe. He lowered his large fluffy brush of fingerprint powder and covered his mouth to sneeze when a puff of the powder escaped it. He sniffed and wrinkled his nose. “I wasn’t expecting to find anything. If they had enough time to walk in and out freely, why didn’t they take their evidence with them? Seems like a silly mistake to make.”

“Because they wanted us to find it,” Claude grinned wolfishly. “I told you they were acting cocky. But, you know, hubris and all that. It might look like they’re one step ahead of us, but they’ve made a crucial error.”

“And what’s that?” Sylvain asked.

“Well,” Claude wrung his hands, “they think they’re taunting _Dimitri_, not the legendary Team Claude.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

\--FELIX--

Felix slammed the door behind him and stalked over to the other side of the room. Dimitri was hot on his heels, opening the slammed door again to follow him inside. Felix bunched his hands in to fists and waited for the inevitable scolding he was about to receive for not playing nice with the criminals. But it didn’t come. Instead, Dimitri sighed and sat himself quietly upon the empty office’s only desk. For some reason, it only made Felix angrier.

“Save your bullshit lecture,” Felix snapped. “I’ve already had an earful from Sylvain about how I should be licking their boots. I don’t need to hear it from you too.”

“It’s really not as bad as you’re making it out to be,” Dimitri said. “I _need_ their help to do this, Felix. Claude is supposed to be the best retrieval artist in all of Fódlan. If anyone’s going to get the locket back, it’s him.”

Felix scoffed and turned around to face Dimitri, forcing as much contempt in to his glare as he could manage. “I’ll believe that when I actually see it.”

Dimitri’s brow furrowed. “He’s already made a lot of progress,” he said, and casting his eyes downward. “More than we ever could. You have to admit that we would never have thought to search for bugging devices. We’d have made fools of ourselves.”

“You don’t know that!” Felix felt his blood boiling beneath his skin, looking desperately for a way to escape before he exploded. “We could have handled it just fine, just like we handled Cornelia!” At the mention of the assassin’s name, Dimitri shrunk in on himself and crossed his arms over his chest. Felix scowled.

“This is different,” Dimitri said. “Dedue’s heard a lot about Claude’s reputation, he says this is the best shot we have of getting the locket back.”

Felix wanted to throw something, but there wasn't anything within his reach. He dug his fingers in to his palms instead. “I don’t give a fuck what Dedue says. Sylvain and I have known you since we were children. Doesn’t what we think matter?”

“Of course it does, Felix! You know that. But, Sylvain agrees with me on this too. You’re the only one being difficult. If you’d just--”

“Don’t fucking patronise me,” Felix hissed. It was probably all bullshit anyway – there was no way a bug was hiding in that office and they were all _fools_ for trusting and believing Claude’s word so readily. They were all eating out of the palm of his hand, but Felix would be damned before he put his trust in someone so easily ever again.

“Felix,” Dimitri sighed and touched the bridge of his nose. “I’m not patronising you. I asked Claude to make room for you because I trust you more than anyone. I was hoping you’d have sped the process along even further, not made it more difficult.”

Why wasn’t anyone understanding him? Last night, in the hotel, Sylvain had tried his best to convince Felix to give everyone a chance as though they weren’t all acting like arrogant, self-righteous criminals, hacking their building CCTV and making threats. They couldn’t trust these people like they could trust each other. They’d always done everything themselves, worked out their problems without the aid of any outside help, and now, all of a sudden, they were grovelling at the feet of a complete stranger. Felix hated it, but nobody else seemed even remotely concerned.

“It wouldn’t be difficult if you’d just let Sylvain and I deal with it, like I said we would.”

“I _am_ letting you deal with it. With Claude’s help. He has the people and the means to get the locket back, Felix, and I need you to stop resisting and just _work _with him.”

Sylvain had said something similar. Something along the lines of _‘they need us as much as we need them’_, but Felix hadn’t really been listening. He’d been too infuriated and humiliated by the clown congregation to even contemplate acting civilised around them.

“You know how much I care about you, Felix. How much I value you, and how much I valued Gle—”

“Don’t,” Felix cut in venomously. “Don’t bring him in to this.” The last thing he needed to think about right now was his brother. Dimitri went to say something but his mouth finally seemed to engage with his brain and he thought better of it. “I can’t believe you’re trusting total strangers with this. Don’t you ever learn?” Felix stomped over to where Dimitri was standing and jabbed him in the shoulder with his finger. “Your boar-headedness is going to get one of us killed. Why am I the only one thinking sensibly?”

Dimitri took a step back and fixed Felix with a concerned frown. “I think you might be _over_thinking this, Felix. Not everyone is out for blood. Claude isn’t an assassin. He’s getting paid to _help _us, he isn’t going to hurt any of us.”

“That’s exactly what you said last time and look where that irresponsibility got us.”

Dimitri grimaced. Felix could almost see the painful memories flashing inside his mind and then his expression turned dark. “Listen, Felix. I know you don’t like it, but this is my decision, and Claude’s going to work with or without you. So you can either stop acting like a child and grow up, or—”

Felix grabbed Dimitri by the collar of his shirt and threw him against the nearest wall, knocking a painting free of its hanging and sending it crashing to the floor. Dimitri’s eyes widened and he stared helplessly down at Felix. He could have easily gotten himself free and pushed Felix off of him, but he didn’t. “Don’t call me a fucking child and don’t come crying to me when this inevitably backfires and they screw you over. The world doesn’t revolve around you, you know.” Dimitri bristled at that, but Felix continued. “We don’t even know who this _Flame Emperor_ is. For all we know, we could be walking right in to another death trap and I'll remind you that Sylvain and I are still a bit sore from the last blades we threw ourselves on for you.”

Dimitri’s gaze withered in to guilt, and then softened. “I appreciate your concern, Felix. I know you’re just looking out for me, for all of us_,_ but this isn’t two years ago. This is now. We’re all better people than we were then. Smarter, wiser. I’m telling you there’s nothing dangerous about this. This isn’t going to go wrong.”

He tightened his grip on Dimitri’s shirt. That much was true, he couldn’t deny it. Felix had thrown himself in to training after the assassination attempt, had vowed that nobody would ever live to humiliate or scare him as much as Cornelia had ever again. Felix wanted to say a multitude of other things like ‘how can you be sure’ and ‘I don’t want to lose anyone else’, but he settled on “You’d better hope to god it doesn’t.”

“If it does, then you can rub it in my face and shout at me to your heart’s content.”

There was an unspoken tension, one that omitted the possibility of him not being alive to do so, but Felix let Dimitri go and watched the bunched wrinkles of his shirt fall back in to place. Arguing this further would only prove pointless. Dimitri had obviously made up his mind, and as much as he hated the idea, all Felix could do now was wait for the impact and pick up the pieces, as usual. “Fine.”

Dimitri straightened and smoothed out his shirt. “Does that mean you’re going to stay? You’re going to give this a chance?”

_No_ teetered on the tip of his tongue; a speedy exit and a tantrum itched beneath his skin, telling him to leave and only come back when they told him he was right all along. But then orange hair and a bright smile danced across his vision and Felix’s shoulders dropped. "Someone has to make sure Sylvain doesn’t get himself locked in that pink maniac’s torture dungeon."

Dimitri sighed. “Thank you,” he said, placing a hand on Felix’s shoulder.

Felix immediately shrugged it off. “Whatever. Just don’t make me regret it.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

When Felix and Dimitri walked back in to the office, the first thing Felix noticed was the chaotic mess littering every crevice of the room. Mud was smeared across the floor, pieces of plastic were strewn about haphazardly, thin wires snaked out from Dimitri’s phone like a colourful tangle of vipers, and piles of books formed small towers outside of the bookcase in alternating patterns of red and blue. Claude stood in the centre of the carnage, his obnoxiously loud shirt a stark contrast to the pale sterility of the office walls and grey Faerghus skyline.

“Ah, you’re back!” he said, throwing his arms in the air. “Look what we found.”

Felix followed Claude’s gesture to the desk where the small, angry child was holding a tiny metal device between her fingers. “We found the bug,” she said with a wicked smile.

Felix felt his stomach flip and his cheeks burn. _They had been correct?_ Someone _had_ just waltzed in to Dimitri’s office and bugged it and they had been none the wiser. Sylvain tried to catch his eye, but Felix ignored him. He wasn’t in the right mind to endure his gloating.

“Where was it?” Dimitri asked, eyes wide. Felix could tell he had been hoping for them to be wrong on this occasion. It wasn’t as though they’d ever really said anything scandalous inside the office walls, but it was unsettling to know they’d been spied on nonetheless. Felix could feel his skin crawling at the thought.

“Hidden in a dark corner under your desk,” the green kid with the glasses said.

Felix had stood next to that desk so many times over the last few months. Had been centimetres away from the bug that had caused this ridiculous mess. They’d been so confident in their security, and all this time they were just feeding the criminal information like _idiots._ What a joke.

“The Flame Emperor is quite the bully,” Claude said, eyeing the device with a smile. “Whoever they are, they’re really intent on humiliating you. Are you sure there’s nobody you’ve pissed off recently?”

Dimitri looked helpless. Even Felix tried to search the corners of his mind for anyone Dimitri might have forgotten. But everything had been so peaceful as of late. Maybe they’d just become too complacent. “No? I mean, I think I’d know if I had.”

“Hm, yeah, I guess so,” Claude said and then his smile twisted in to something bitter and accusatory. “Like how you’d know if you’d almost been assassinated, _right_?”

“Ah. So you’ve heard.”

“Yes,” Claude said, voice eerily expressionless. “I have.”

“I can assure you, this is an entirely separate matter. If this was anything to do with Cornelia, she definitely wouldn’t have done something so mundane as to steal my locket. There’d be significantly more blood involved, that’s for certain.”

Claude hummed. He didn’t look impressed. “Well, you see, Mr. Blaidydd, I make it a habit not to get my team involved in cases that could potentially endanger their lives. That is why I conduct initial interviews, after all. So if there’s another bombshell you’re keeping from me that you’d like to share now, I’d be happy to hear it.”

Dimitri looked from Felix to Dedue as though searching for support, but Felix turned away. Dimitri could weather this shit storm on his own.

“You have my word that I know of no more potential threats surrounding this case than you do, Mr. Riegan. Honestly, Cornelia hadn’t even crossed my mind. Even if she weren’t currently residing in a prison cell, this would be way too calculated and careful a scheme to be her work.”

“I guess I’ll take your word for it, but any more surprises like this, and you can have your money back and find your locket yourself.”

Felix’s eyebrows shot up. He definitely hadn’t expected Claude to be so concerned for his team’s wellbeing. At least not to the point of denying such a large amount of money and cancelling their contract altogether. Felix didn’t know much about hired help like private investigators or retrieval artists, but from what he had learned over the years, they tended to value money over anything else. Money and glory. But Claude seemed different, like he was doing this job because he enjoyed it, rather than for the selfish reasoning of greed or egotism. That was definitely interesting.

“Of course,” Dimitri bowed his head. “The last thing I want to do is endanger any of you. This wasn’t supposed to get so complicated.”

“Oh, don’t worry about that,” the one Felix hadn’t heard speak yet, on account of him being passed out through their entire meeting the day previous, said. He had a perpetually lazy voice, like he was permanently teetering on the edge of sleep. It made Felix tired just to listen to him. “We’ve encountered far more duplicitous characters than yourself in our time. But Claude does like to worry about us.”

"Unnecessarily so," glasses kid added.

The small angry one crossed her arms over her chest and added, “Like a nagging parent."

“Well then,” Claude cleared his throat and extended his hand in Dimitri’s direction. “As long as that’s all cleared up, we’ll take our leave. I believe we have everything we need to start laying the foundations, and we have a lot of work to do. The next time I talk with you, I’ll hopefully bring some good news. Also, sorry about your office.”

“That’s not a problem,” Dimitri said, surveying the damages. “It’s all for a good cause, after all. Thank you for everything."

Claude nodded once and led everyone back out of the office. Felix didn’t stop to exchange any further conversation with Dimitri or Dedue – he just fell behind everyone else at a respectable distance, keeping his words firmly to himself. He didn’t even gripe about the lack of space in the elevator on the way down, quietly seeking out the corner to avoid Sylvain’s inquisitive gaze. 

Claude and his team kept mumbling amongst themselves. Felix tried to drown them out but it proved near impossible with their close proximity, though he might as well have not been listening. The conversation revolved around complicated tech talk that Felix couldn’t even begin to decipher.

“You can follow our car,” Claude said to them once they exited the building. He handed Sylvain a scrap of crumpled paper. “Or if you have some stuff to do first, here’s the new address. We’ll be staying there until further notice, so you also might want to book yourselves a hotel nearby.”

“Cool,” Sylvain said. He narrowed his eyes at the scribbled address, and then his eyebrows shot up when he recognised it. “Myrddin? That’s quite far away. At least a two hour drive from here.”

Felix mirrored his surprise. Myrddin _was_ far away. It would certainly be annoying to travel back to Fhirdiad from so far away, and Felix hated talking over the internet. He tried to hide his distaste. They were also going to have to pack more bags.

“That it is,” Claude said. “But it actually works out in our favour. It’s a relatively central location – we’re still not certain on the thief’s whereabouts and judging by the signal strength, they could be hiding absolutely anywhere.”

“Sounds fair enough,” Sylvain said and then looked over his shoulder to gauge Felix’s reaction. He steeled his expression, forcing himself to appear as neutral and unbothered as possible. He was fed up of people questioning him and scolding him. He wasn’t going to let it happen again – he was going to simply wait it all out and wait for justice to find him.

“I’m driving,” Felix said when they parted ways from the retrieval group. His hands were itching for something to do and the thought of sitting still for two hours staring out of the window was unimaginable. He’d probably lose his mind.

“You sure? I know you hate long drives.”

“Yes. Just get in the car.”

“Okie dokie.” Sylvain skipped around the car, a sleek black Mustang that looked as though it belonged to a duo from a spy movie, and popped open the passenger side door. As soon as he settled in his seat, he pulled out his phone and tapped the address in to the GPS system, humming a tune under his breath.

Sylvain seemed a lot happier than he had the day previous, Felix couldn’t help but notice. During their short stay in the mouldy cave Claude called his home, he’d been rather quiet. Sylvain enjoyed talking to people, especially people as interesting as the strange group of individuals that comprised Team Claude, and Felix knew it had pained him not to join in on their ridiculous conversation and horrific takeaway food haul. But they still couldn’t be trusted, and Felix wasn’t going to just let them hack their way in to his life as easily as they had hacked the building CCTV. He wasn't going to let them take Sylvain.

It took ten minutes of near silent driving for Sylvain to finally ask the inevitable, “You OK, Fe?”

Felix tightened his grip on the wheel. The underlying tension that came with talking about the assassination attempt sat heavy on the air. Neither of them enjoyed talking about it. Felix was grateful that he didn’t mention it outright. “I’m fine,” he sighed.

Sylvain hummed, and then Felix caught his expression change. “Hey, remember when we were kids?”

“Nope,” Felix said. “I’ve never been a child.”

“_Ha ha._” Sylvain rolled his eyes and ignored him. “Remember when we said we were going to grow up and be super-secret spy agents?”

Felix scoffed and glanced at the GPS to make the correct turning. Fhirdiad could be a maze at the best of times - he didn't want to take a wrong turning and get stuck in the rush hour traffic. “Becoming security for the dumbest man in all of Fódlan is quite the step down.”

Sylvain's face stretched in to a smile. In his periphery vision, Felix could feel the weight of his stare upon him. He swallowed and kept his eyes on the road ahead. “I think this is the closest we’ve ever gotten to that dream. We’re watching people _hack_ shit, Felix! Isn’t that cool? Do you think we’re going to, like, climb through vents, and go undercover with earpieces?”

“No, Sylvain. This isn’t a trashy spy movie.”

“I don’t know, I saw some pretty snazzy looking equipment back at their place. That one kid, Ignatz, he has like a billion laptops. Who even needs that many laptops? What does he even do with them?”

“Illegal shit, probably.”

Sylvain groaned and slumped back in his seat, hitting his head against the chair. “Come on, stop being a killjoy, Fe. This is exciting! You used to dream of climbing through laser gates and hanging from ceilings.”

“Yes, and then I grew up.”

“I’ll give it a few days.” Sylvain patted Felix’s thigh with a wide, toothy grin. It took every ounce of Felix’s concentration not to crash the car. He was actually pretty proud of how well he managed to school his expression. “You’ll be scheming with them like you were part of the team all along. I know better than anyone that behind all that pride, you’re _dying_ to get involved.”

Sylvain was right, but Felix would be damned to hell and back before he’d ever admit that out loud. This whole plan was still stupidly reckless, and he wasn’t going to pretend to enjoy it when it put so many people at risk. The wounds of their last mistake still hadn’t healed entirely.

Felix shifted in his seat and Sylvain retracted his hand suddenly, his smile faltering for a split second. “You’re delusional,” Felix said, trying to stop the mood from shifting.

“Then that makes two of us,” Sylvain laughed, and then he leaned forward to turn on the radio, letting the sound of pop music settle over them for the long drive ahead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for all of your lovely comments and for your kudos! i hope you enjoyed this chapter! :D


	4. THREE BUILDINGS.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> golden deer: caspar let me see what you have  
caspar: A KNIFE  
golden deer: NO

CHAPTER FOUR: CLAUDE

THREE BUILDINGS

“Oh my god, I love this place already,” Lysithea said, eyes widening when she caught her first glimpse of their new headquarters in Myrddin. “Are you sure this is ours?”

The outside certainly was impressive; the picture online hadn’t really done it much justice. It was two storey, made of sturdy grey brick, and perched atop some steps on a street of similar looking buildings. Their house in particular had a yellow front door and a golden knocker in the shape of a dragon; a feature that had most definitely swayed Claude’s purchasing decision in to the house’s favour. Claude had read that it once stood as an odd shop, selling all manners of random items and knick-knacks, and had only shut down because the owner had suddenly passed away. He was secretly hoping to find the interior full of forgotten trinkets and inexplicably cursed objects.

“You haven’t even seen the inside yet,” Claude laughed, and then dropped his voice to a scared whisper. “What if it’s haunted?”

Luckily, the car had already been parked and powered off when Lysithea hit Claude in the back of the head. Ignatz did not care to save him a second time now that they were no longer in danger of causing a ten car pileup. Once she was satisfied with her inflicted damage, Lysithea turned her wary gaze on to the building, searching it for evidence of the horror movie variety. Linhardt also looked paler than usual, casting sidelong glances at the building when he thought nobody was looking, but Claude caught him in the rear-view mirror. It never fell short of amusing that the two most scientifically inclined members of his team were also the most susceptible to tales of the paranormal.

“It’s not, though, right?” Lysithea asked, suddenly sounding much younger and quieter than usual.

“No, course not,” Claude said, unbuckling his seatbelt to turn around and face her. “I’m sure the previous owner dying suddenly under mysterious circumstances was just a coincidence.”

“Claude,” Marianne warned. “Leave the poor girl alone.” She turned to face Lysithea and reached over the seats to pat her knee in a reassuring gesture. “No, Lys, it’s not haunted.”

Lysithea didn’t look convinced and ignored Marianne to glare at Claude. “If you’ve bought us a haunted house, Claude, I’ll kill you.”

“You know, I’m getting kind of bored of all these death threats. Nobody ever seems to follow through on them. Is it because you’re scared I’ll come back to _haunt you?_”

“Shut up!” Lysithea popped open the car door and threw herself out, smoothing out the crumpled folds of her skirt with forced nonchalance to the sound of Claude’s laughter. Everybody eventually followed suit, and Claude was relieved to note that the moving trucks had already been and gone. Hopefully all of their equipment would fit inside nicely; Claude wasn’t elated at the idea of spending the next few weeks inside a building that more resembled a storage cupboard than a headquarters.

Claude had a key to the residence, and it was no doubt unlocked since everyone was inside unpacking, but he still couldn’t resist using the knocker. The metal ring was heavy in his hand and he tapped it against the plate three times feeling like a character from an old-timey period drama; all he needed to complete the look was a monocle and a top hat. Claude pursed his lips as he waited for an answer, feeling the expectant stares of his team piercing his back, but the dull thrum of music behind the door told him that it wasn’t likely anyone would come to answer. With a sigh, Claude gave in and opened the door himself, reluctantly abandoning all of the witty introductions he’d had planned. It felt like such a waste.

They found the rest of the team in what they had swiftly refashioned in to the living room. They’d managed to fit both of their sofas inside and Hilda was already sprawled atop one, flicking through the TV’s music channels to find something worth listening to as the rest of the team worked around her hauling boxes around. Claude was glad to see that they’d prioritised the tech stations first; there were already desks set up in one corner of the room, attached to what had once been the shop counter to form an enclosed square of computer monitors, office chairs, and laptops. The rest of the room was piled high with cardboard moving boxes, most of which would probably remain unopened until they moved on to their next residence.

“Oh, hey, gang!” Raphael smiled from a doorway, two boxes stacked on top of each other in his arms. He readjusted them to carry them both effortlessly in one arm and gave them all a wave. “We’re almost done! This place is great!”

“Yeah,” Hilda said from the sofa. “Nice job, Claude. We have actual _windows_ now_._”

“I do aim to please,” Claude said with a smile. He left out the part where it was the only building in a one-hundred mile radius that was not only big enough to fit so many people and so much equipment, but also be purchased on such short notice. It would probably diminish the charm.

Claude and Marianne joined in with the unpacking process, while the techs made quick work of setting up their computers to a more suitable standard. Lysithea was already rifling through her wire boxes, searching for her tracking equipment, and Linhardt and Ignatz were studying the Flame Emperor’s message card under a forensic microscope, muttering things in hushed tones over loading laptops.

Raphael had said they were almost finished unpacking, but it still took them all another few hours to move everything around and fit it all in, in which time Felix and Sylvain had finally caught up and been let inside. Felix looked considerably less irritable than usual, and Claude wasn’t sure if that was due to their new residence being considerably more palatable, or Felix being in a better mood overall. It was impossible to work that kid out. Maybe his shouting match with Dimitri had relieved him of some of his anger. Claude could only hope that was the case – it would certainly make things easier. Judging by the way Sylvain had managed to coerce him in to folding up some of the emptied cardboard boxes, it seemed having hope wasn’t hopeless.

After some further exploration, Claude found that the upstairs was pretty spacious, and the previous tenant had left some furniture for them inside the bedrooms in the form of two rickety beds and a dressing table. A rifle through said dressing table yielded no unusual objects, much to Claude’s disappointment - he’d have to go searching more thoroughly later on - but in better news, he also discovered that they now had a toilet that didn’t sound like an angry sewage monster when flushed.

They sorted through endless piles of junk, and Claude made everyone decide on what they actually needed to keep and what could be taken to a donation centre when they found the time. It proved hard to convince Linhardt to part with his box of useless, outdated plugs, but Claude managed to persuade him with the promise of some new equipment to make up for the loss. Leonie also got rid of the training equipment that was beyond repair, and Hilda sorted through their accumulated disguise closet for clothes that were either too ugly, or too ruined to ever be worn again.

Late afternoon was already creeping in by the time the boxes decreased enough in quantity for them to call it a good day’s work. With a satisfied sigh, Claude finally allowed himself a well-earned seat on the sofa next to Hilda, stretching his legs out and frowning when he realised there was no longer a coffee table to rest his feet upon. Leonie had already shown him the replacement she had lined up. It was due to arrive later in the day, because nobody seemed able to cope without a surface to put their hot beverages on.

There wasn’t much to do other than wait until the tech team made a breakthrough in locating the source of the bug, so Claude allowed himself to close his eyes and think.

The case was shaping up to be just as interesting as he had hoped. Sure there were curve balls being launched at him with the ferocity and speed of a pitching machine, but Claude was used to the pressure. Enjoyed it, even. It wasn’t very often that Claude encountered a thief with real promise. Those who stole from his clients tended to be a bit on the careless side, often in the understanding that those they were stealing from were just as foolish and careless as themselves. In Claude’s experience, neither side ever really engaged enough with their brains to think more than one step ahead. At least it made his job a little easier.

A loud _bang_ pulled him from his thoughts, and Claude scrambled to sit upright. Lysithea and Linhardt jumped and shouted breathless curses from their little corner of wires and screens, hands over their hearts with eyes warily searching for any kind of paranormal threat.

“Woah! What the fuck? Look what I found!” Caspar’s voice sounded throughout the house, accompanied by the thundering sound of hurried footsteps from up above. Everybody visibly relaxed when they realised it was just Caspar being his clumsy self. That was, until Caspar came screeching around the corner and hurtling through the living room door brandishing a sword. Claude eyed the sharp glint of the tip and came to the startling realisation that it was, in fact, a _real _sword and not just a realistic prop.

Claude held up his hands and got to his feet, eyes wide and heart in his throat. “Oh my _god_, Caspar, please put the sword down!”

Caspar did _not_ put the sword down. Instead, he began swinging it around, grunting and crying out battle-themed threats that would have been hilarious were he not dangerously close to impaling someone to death. Lorenz artfully dodged having his head severed from his body when Caspar attempted a particularly over-ambitious swing at the same time Lorenz ducked in to the living room. Everybody complained with panicked protests, but nobody was willing to get close enough to disarm him, not after the Taser Incident.

“Fucking--! Stop it, Caspar!” Leonie screeched, watching him swing the weapon in to the door frame with a wooden _crack_ and a shower of splintered wood.

“Hey, Linhardt, look! I found this thing in the attic!” he said, eyes alight, blue hair full of dust and cobwebs. Linhardt gave him an impressed thumbs up from his corner, pulled out his phone to snap a picture of Caspar posing with the sword and then returned to his microscope. The sword was definitely too big for Caspar to use, but what he lacked in bulk, he made up for in enthusiasm and threw it downwards in a clumsy arc, slicing a sizeable cut in to the carpet. He winced at the destruction and then turned to Claude to ask, “Who the hell used to live here anyway? A knight?”

“I’d bet on someone who could actually wield a sword correctly,” Felix scoffed from the other side of the room before Claude could answer. Everyone turned to look at him with varying degrees of incredulity. Felix swallowed nervously under all of the sudden attention but then jutted his chin out and stood his ground. “You’re not even holding it right,” he said, pointing out Caspar’s loose grip on the sword handle.

Caspar looked at him for a moment and then scowled. “Oh yeah? As if _you_ know how to hold a sword properly, rich boy,” he laughed scathingly and swung the sword around again in an attempted flourish, narrowly missing Leonie’s punching bag by the slightest of margins. Claude _really_ should have said something about keeping their new residence in one piece, but he couldn’t find it within himself to truly care. At least not enough to interrupt the entertainment.

Felix narrowed his eyes. “As a matter of fact, I do.”

“Your dick doesn’t count,” Leonie said tiredly.

Felix’s face turned red and he sent Sylvain an aggressive glare that made his smirk drop as he scrambled to Felix’s defence. Claude wasn't sure if it was a well-intentioned defence, however, because all Sylvain said after clearing his throat was, “Felix is actually something of a sword aficionado."

“Oh _really_?” Leonie snorted and tried to keep her composure. She wasn’t doing so well - her bottom lip was trembling and her chest was shaking with the need to laugh. “Lorenz also loves swords, and you don’t hear him being an asshole about it.”

Lorenz sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Leonie, please.”

Caspar’s brow furrowed and he lowered the sword. “Wait, are we still actually talking about swords? Because I didn’t know Lorenz could sword fight!” He turned to Lorenz in awe. “Can you show me what to do with mine?”

Leonie lost it and doubled over laughing, burying her head in one of the sofa cushions to drown out the sound.

“No, Caspar, sweetie.” Hilda said with an apologetic smile. “We’re talking about dicks.”

Caspar’s eyes widened. “_Oh_, OK. That makes _way_ more sense. In that case, uh, I definitely don’t need your help with…uh…that. Thanks, Lorenz.”

“Whatever,” Felix cut in over the chorus of laughter and crossed his arms over his chest, clearly not happy with the direction the conversation had taken. His face had also flushed a significantly darker shade of pink. “Laugh all you want, you’ll end up killing someone with that if you continue. Or worse, you’ll damage the sword.”

“You know what?” Caspar raised the sword again and everybody visibly recoiled. Even Felix. “I’m sure there’s another sword up in that attic somewhere, how about we fight it out? See who the better sword a-fishy-whateverthefuckyousaid really is.”

“Or,” Claude cut in, “we could _not_ do that.” He wasn’t keen on the idea of adding to the house’s death toll. Nor was he looking forward to cleaning the inevitable bloodbath from the carpet.

“Go find it then.” Felix ignored Claude and his face spread out in to a wicked smile. “I’d destroy you in less than ten seconds.”

“Oh, fantastic. I’ve turned invisible,” Claude scowled.

“Ha! As if! I’m the toughest one here!”

Felix’s laugh was dry and callous. “There really is no hope for us if _you’re_ the best this team has to offer.”

“For the record, I would like to state that Caspar is not actually the toughest one here,” Hilda said.

Hilda got ignored too when Caspar stabbed the sword through the carpet and lodged it in to the floorboards lying beneath. “I’ve had enough of this guy,” Caspar shouted. He made to roll up his sleeves, but discovered he was wearing a tank top and settled for cracking his knuckles instead. “We’ll settle this the old fashioned way, how about that?”

“The ‘old fashioned way’?” Felix raised an eyebrow.

“Yeah! Let’s take this out back. I’ll pulverise your stupid face with my fists!”

To the concern of absolutely everyone, Felix looked elated at the idea.

“Oh fuck, no, Felix. Please don’t hurt anyone.” Sylvain put a hand on his shoulder and looked uneasy for the first time that entire conversation.

"It's _him_ you should be worried about," Caspar sneered at Sylvain’s unwarranted concern.

Linhardt looked up from his microscope, interest piqued now that his boyfriend was about to get himself in to an actual fist fight. “Wait, think logically here. He’s got an _undercut_, Caspar. Are you sure you want to fight someone like that?”

“But don’t I also have an undercut?” Caspar asked, hand rubbing the closely shaved hair at the back of his head.

“Precisely my point.”

“_Nobody_ will be fighting today!” Claude finally managed to interject. He would never say it out loud on account of his unwavering sense of loyalty to his family, but Caspar would most likely get his ass handed to him by Felix in a matter of seconds. Where Caspar was trained, like everyone else, in self-defence and last-resort combat, Felix was undoubtedly trained to take down life-threatening danger with cutthroat precision. Perhaps more importantly, Claude just did _not_ want to deal with a pouting Caspar for the next three weeks when he inevitably found himself out of his depth. He needed him at his peak for this case. “If you want to beat the shit out of each other, you’ll have to wait for our weekly sparring sessions where there are no dangerous objects, and no sharp table corners to crack our skulls on.”

“Boring!” Leonie jeered.

“Oh really?” Claude said, and saw the bright light of opportunity twinkling before him like a vision from the universe itself. ‘_Unification’_ it sang, promising peaceful times like a deceptive siren – Claude wasn’t sure whether what he was about to do was going to deepen the divide, or bring two worlds closer, but there was only one way to find out. “I was going to suggest we settle this like civilised people.”

“And how do you propose we do that?”

“I have to wonder myself, Claude,” Lorenz said. “Regrettably, even I must admit that we’re not exactly a _civilised_ group of people.”

“Ha! Fools,” Claude scoffed and held out his hand. With a dramatically deepened voice, he simply said, “Fetch me the Nintendo Switch.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

“How is _this_ supposed to settle anything?” Felix scowled at the TV screen, and then the controller like it was one of Linhardt’s strange inventions. “It’s a children’s game.”

Hilda groaned and rolled her eyes. “God, it’s no wonder you’re so pissy. Do you even know what the word ‘fun’ means? Like, is it actually in your vocabulary?”

“Of course it is,” Felix snapped. “I just prefer to spend my time doing more useful things.”

“Useful things… God, listen to this guy,” Caspar scoffed and then pointed at the screen where Little Mac was waiting to fight. “Just shut up and pick a damn character already so I can beat you.”

Felix looked to Claude with fire burning in his eyes. “This is hardly fair.”

Claude shrugged, unable to believe that Felix had sat himself upon the sofa to engage in the challenge at all. He’d half expected him to scoff and storm off. “My house, my rules. Not my fault your super-secret spy training doesn’t cover Smash tournaments.”

“For the eight-hundredth time, we’re not _spies,” _Felix grumbled, but eventually gave up and looked down at his controllers to work out which buttons corresponded to character selection. Luckily, Sylvain had at least some knowledge on how to handle a gaming device, and he leaned over Felix to coach him clumsily in to picking Marth. Felix looked so out of his depth that Claude almost felt sorry for him. _Almost_. Definitely not enough to let him practice before hand.

“Ha, how predictable,” Caspar grinned.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Felix narrowed his eyes at Caspar, and then his gaze flickered to his controller, suddenly doubting his choice.

“Nothing, sword boy,” Caspar snickered.

The game loaded. Caspar chose Battlefield to make things easier for everyone, the announcer yelled "_go!__"_ and then Felix walked Marth right off the edge of the stage. “That doesn’t count!” he shouted, glaring holes in to his own hands as though they had betrayed him.

“I’m afraid it does,” Lorenz said tiredly. To anyone else, it might have sounded like Lorenz was just being callous. But to everyone seated on the sofas watching Felix’s descent in to misery, it was a solemn reminder of Lorenz’s humbling introduction to the world of video games. There had never been, nor would there ever be, mercy when it came to Smash.

“Bullshit,” Felix snapped. “I reiterate - how the_ fuck_ is this a fair settlement of our strength?”

“How about you pay attention and reiterate _this_, assface.” Caspar mashed the buttons on his controller, his tongue sticking out in immense concentration as he sent a flurry of digital punches in to Marth’s face, launching him clean off of the stage once more. Felix glared at Caspar and made a dissatisfied noise, complaining once again about the integrity of the competition.

During their final round, Felix managed to stay on the stage for a few seconds longer than his previous attempts, but ultimately, Marth got launched off screen for a final time and Caspar was announced the winner to the sound of Team Claude’s whoops and cheers. “Guess now we know who would win in a real fight,” Caspar shrugged with a wicked grin. He shook his controller around like a prized trophy, kissing the buttons and thanking Leonie and Raphael for their unwavering support in an emotional speech.

“This is ridiculous.” Felix stared at the screen in disbelief as Little Mac’s victory screen played, and then he threw the controllers aside. “I refuse to continue.”

Before anyone could offer any insulting comments, Sylvain picked up the controllers and bounced in his seat. “Don’t worry. I’ll avenge you, Felix,” he winked.

“Like you can do any better,” Felix scoffed, slumping back in his seat.

“Sure I can. I didn’t spend my teenage years polishing my swords like you, y’know.” He poked Felix in the side and earned himself a colourful curse. And then he added with a mischievous smile and a wiggle of his eyebrows, “At least not in the same way.”

Hilda made a face and sat up, retracting her arm from its usual place around Marianne’s shoulders. “Ew, gross. Here, hand me that damned controller, Caspar. _I’m_ fighting this clown.”

Caspar complied and threw Hilda the controller, still basking in his ridiculous victory that was less a battle and more a vicious mockery of Felix’s video game ineptitude. Either way – Caspar had classed it a satisfactory win, and stretched his legs and arms out, relaxing in to the sofa with an unwavering grin.

Claude said a silent prayer for both Sylvain and Solid Snake when Hilda chose Peach, and then got up to check on the techs, content that his plan hadn’t backfired like he’d imagined it would. Because Felix may still have been pouting and refusing to take any further part in the game, but he was at least sitting in the same vicinity as his team. Claude was all for those small victories.

“How are things going, Lys?” Claude asked, leaning against her desk and peering over the top of her monitor. She gave him a look that screamed, ‘_please don’t interrupt me’_ but ceased her furious typing to give Claude a report nevertheless.

“It’s going about as well as I’d hoped,” she said. “Their security is tight – which I’d guessed it would be since they at least know how to hack CCTV and replace feeds, but I’ve managed to find a general location.”

Claude’s eyebrows shot up, definitely not expecting to have heard such good news so early in to their investigation. “Already? Wow, Lys. You’re amazing!”

Lysithea stuck her lips out in an embarrassed pout and Claude had to stop himself from ruffling her hair lest he lose his hand. “I know,” she said and then turned her screen around to show Claude. The screen showed a map of Fódlan, and Claude narrowed his eyes at it, trying to decipher what she was trying to show him. “It’s coming from Adrestia.” She pointed to the bottom of the map where she then drew a large circle over several territories with her finger. “I can’t pinpoint an exact location yet, I’ll need to break down a few more walls before I can link the device back to any specific laptops or desktops, but it’s definitely thereabouts.”

“Adrestia,” Claude hummed. It was quite the distance from Fhirdiad - at least a three hour drive to reach the border. Luckily, their new Myrddin residence would make the trips down south much easier and much faster. “It would seem as though our little bug is a long way from home.”

Lysithea ignored the shouts of “_Woah! Take it easy, Peach, jeez,” _and “_No, fuck you,” _to say, “It would indeed.”

“Lin, Ignatz, what do you have for me?”

Ignatz looked up from his work and gave Claude a reassuring smile, the screen of his laptop casting an unsettlingly sinister glow upon his glasses. “We’ve come to the same conclusion. Turns out that the ink used to print this card is quite unique – there aren’t many printing companies across Fódlan who print such high quality and expensive products. All of the local websites we’ve found in Faerghus and Leicester don’t offer the same kind of finish, but we’ve found a place online in Adrestia that can make us an exact replica, right down to the exact shade of shimmering silver lettering.”

“It’s not of as much use to us as the bug is, since it’s unlikely the thief is hiding out in a printing building, but it does at least tell us more about them and the way they operate,” Linhardt shrugged, pulling the card out from the microscope’s slide and handing it back to Claude. “Of course, we could later do some digging to find the invoice for the purchase of the card in the hopes of tracing it back to a single buyer. That might prove difficult however, if the card was produced as a favour or obtained by other means than through a monetary transaction.”

Claude turned the card over in his fingers, watching the light catch the reflective lettering. He stared at the taunting words, trying to imagine what the thief might have looked like holding it in their own hands, smugly slipping it in to the safe after a job well executed. “What about the safe, any luck?”

“Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to extract anything of use from the safe. I’m afraid not a single shred of DNA or forensic evidence was left behind, other than yourself, Dedue’s and Dimitri’s.”

“Ah, I expected as much,” Claude mused. “Thanks for your work anyway, Lin, I appreciate it.”

“I mean, it’s my job and you’re paying me, but you’re welcome.”

Claude waved him off and climbed over the desks to sink in to an office chair and load up a laptop of his own. He pulled up Lysithea’s protected search engine and began his preliminary searches of The Flame Emperor. As Linhardt had already discovered, the initial searches only seemed to paint the Flame Emperor as a Yu-Gi-Oh! fan, turning up copious amounts of statistics regarding the cards and their value. It wasn’t until Claude filtered the results like Linhardt had taught him to that he found anything of actual interest.

Adrestia came up again. A single use of the name ‘Flame Emperor’ was used a year prior to the theft on an antiques forum. The comments under the name had since been deleted, but the profile remained, the location they’d signed up under being an Adrestian address. It was possible they’d been attempting to glean information on the whereabouts of the locket well before they’d attempted the heist – did that mean they hadn’t originally known that Dimitri was in possession of the locket? Claude ran a hand through his hair and leaned forward. Resting his chin in one hand he tried to search for any comments that hadn’t been replaced by ‘This comment has been deleted by the user’.

“What’cha doing, boss?” Lysithea asked from her station, watching Claude’s brow furrow.

“I’m doing some digging of my own. I don’t like sitting around.”

“Are you sure you’re not just avoiding having your ass kicked in Smash in front of the spy boys?” she laughed.

“That is absolutely _not_ the case,” Claude frowned, despite it absolutely being the case. He’d never been much good at the game – there were too many buttons to press and too little time to press them in. He excelled more so in games that tested his mental fortitude, rather than his ability to process a fast paced brawl, and he definitely wasn’t going to make a fool of himself in front of the new recruits. While he wasn’t as disastrously bad as Felix, Claude did have an image to maintain.

“If you say so,” Lysithea laughed. “But just so you’re aware, I’m only waiting on a code to break. I’ll have a possible location in around ten minutes.”

“Perfect,” Claude broke out in a smile and the shouts from the other side of the room erupted again when Felix snatched back the controller and demanded to verse Lorenz on account of him being the weakest player. A foolish mistake really, since Lorenz had arguably become the most feared player amidst their ranks in his determination not to endure any further mockery from the rest of the team. That soon became apparent when Felix suffered against an unrelenting barrage of Bayonetta kicks and shouted unending profanities at both Lorenz for playing and Leonie for encouraging him.

Claude tuned it all out, turning back to his research. He scrolled endlessly through forum posts about lost artefacts and online antique appraisals, searching for The Flame Emperor’s name, but couldn’t find a single comment that hadn’t been meticulously deleted. Whoever they were, they’d obviously made an attempt to cover their tracks, even if it hadn’t been entirely thorough. Claude saved multiple screenshots, and then shut the laptop down when Lysithea gave him a nudge.

“It’s done,” she said.

“Show me.”

Linhardt and Ignatz joined Claude in standing behind Lysithea as she brought up the map of Fódlan again, this time the Adrestian portion of the map was glowing with three distinct markers.

“It appears as though three separate devices were connected to the bug, listening to the office at any given time.”

“So there are more people involved than we thought,” Claude mumbled. “Interesting. Unsettling. Continue.”

“I’ve managed to pinpoint the locations to three buildings. Interestingly enough, one of them is the printing business that more than likely manufactured the card. It’s called Varley Prints, but we’ll label it the Varley building for convenience purposes. Then we also have connections in a publishing company, we’ll call that building the Aegir building, and finally, there’s another, albeit weaker connection in the Hresvelg building.”

Claude touched a contemplative finger to his lip. “So many buildings,” he said. “Such a strange way of operating. All so far apart from each other. Well, let’s leave it there for now. We’ll elaborate further to the whole team. Ignatz, before we reconvene, could you get me the blueprints for all three buildings? I suspect yourself and Lorenz will probably be able to shed some light on things with them.”

Both Lysithea and Ignatz nodded and got to work making their findings presentable while Claude made them celebratory cups of coffee in their new kitchen. He was especially proud of the team for prioritising the coffee machine above all other kitchen appliance installations. Claude could hear the whirring of their industrial sized printer spitting out paper in the background and knew that Ignatz had already done a spectacular job. He designated Ignatz the biggest mug and made his way in to the living room to the chorus of dissent surrounding the end of another round of character choices.

“Aw, Claude, did you make that for me? How sweet of you,” Hilda cooed when she noticed him, reaching out for a mug. Claude batted her hand away and then blanked when he realised there still wasn’t a coffee table to put the coffee mug on. Leonie very pointedly avoided his eyes.

“No,” he said, standing awkwardly, holding the steaming mug out of her reach. “These are for the tech team for doing _actual_ work instead of popping a vein playing Smash and bullying the newbies.”

“Hey! You came up with the genius idea,” Leonie said.

“Insignificant details,” Claude said. “What matters is, the tech team have found us possible locations to start our investigations, so turn that shit off and gather round, kids.” Claude didn’t miss the way that Felix and Sylvain perked up at the announcement. He couldn’t _wait_ to show them just how great his team were.

With an audible _click_, the TV switched off and Caspar put the Switch away, bouncing excitedly at the prospect of some good news. Eventually, the tech team joined them, gratefully accepting their coffee mugs with smug expressions and seating themselves upon the sofas like revered royalty.

“OK, listen up,” Claude began, clapping his hands together to quieten the room. “Lysithea has very cleverly narrowed our search down to three possible locations for a base of operation. The signal from the bug has pinged devices in Varley, Aegir, and Hresvelg, so we’ll begin by performing some surface-level reconnaissance in each of the buildings to gather some intelligence. Since they’re closer, we’ll start by looking in to the Varley and Aegir buildings – a printing and publishing company respectively. We’ll split in to two teams and take a building each, and then split further again. I want an under-cover group to walk around, ask annoying questions and make everything easier for the infiltration teams that will go in later that night to break in to the security rooms."

“Wait, why do you have to get in to their security rooms?” Sylvain asked. “Can’t you just hack their CCTV like you did our building?”

“We have to assume that these people will be significantly better prepared against hacking threats than your boss,” Claude said apologetically with a shake of his head. “We’ll have to do this the old fashioned way by downloading their recent CCTV footage straight from the source.”

“Aw yeah! I love doing things the old way,” Raphael beamed. “All this tech stuff gets so confusing.”

“I think taking the more unorthodox approach will benefit us,” Lorenz agreed, pursing his lips at the blueprints. “If they are as tech savvy as you say, us hacking them so brazenly might just be as bold as walking through the front door and announcing our business.”

“That was my thought exactly.” Claude winked at Lorenz and earned himself a small huff and an eye roll. “We’ll need to make sure that we’re completely invisible without resorting to ghosting ourselves on the cameras, at least not until we’re serious. If we give ourselves away too early, it’s likely that they’ll move the locket to an even more secure location, and that is the worst possible case scenario that we need to avoid at all costs. The Flame Emperor needs to believe they are in control and still winning. We need them to stay cocky.”

Interestingly enough, Felix stayed quiet during the relaying of information. Claude’s gaze kept wandering towards him, waiting for an outraged outburst, but he remained silent, arms crossed over his chest, head tilted slightly with a contemplative frown.

“Ignatz, what were you able to gather from the Varley building?”

Ignatz sat up straight, pushing his glasses further up on to his face with a finger and shuffling his piles of blueprints to find the corresponding building. “The Varley building is the lowest-tech of all the buildings in its structure. It’s a five storey printing establishment; quite old-fashioned-looking; grey brick walls, too many windows. The blueprints show no ventilation systems, at least not ones big enough for any of us to fit in. In the day time, it’s a busy office place – there are currently forty-five employees working there in various offices, but after ten the entire building gets powered down and locked up.”

“Perfect,” Lorenz shared a knowing smile with Ignatz. As the two best versed in infiltration, they’d already made sense of things that Claude and the rest of the team hadn’t. “This one will be child’s play. We’ll just need to find out which office room contains the security footage and plan accordingly.”

“Great,” Claude smiled. “In that case, let’s move on to the Aegir building.”

“Slightly more difficult,” Ignatz’s smile dimmed slightly and small lines of worry etched themselves in between his eyebrows. “The Aegir building is a high rise publishing company. I’m talking almost as large as the Blaidydd building. The security is significantly stricter, but according to the blueprints, there are vents large enough to work with.”

Lorenz crouched down and ran a hand over the blueprints. As he studied them, a strand of purple hair came loose from its tie to fall down around his face, and he made no effort to move it. He kept his attention entirely upon the expanse of paper, eyes flickering and darting around as plans formed themselves inside his mind. Claude loved watching Lorenz think – he had such a brilliant mind when he wasn’t using it to whine about the team’s manners or vulgarity.

“What do you think, Lorenz?” Claude asked.

“I think,” he said after a moment of silence. “That it’ll be difficult, but not impossible to do this undetected.”

“Not impossible, I like that.”

“The vents,” he elaborated, fingers dancing over the blue prints as he pointed out the ventilation systems, “are definitely wide enough for a person. It’s not very often that you find that to be the case in modern buildings, but if we dress accordingly, we should be able to scale the building from the inside without alerting any cameras to our presence. That is, at least, until we get to the security office itself.” He paused and touched a finger delicately to his lip. “If there is a camera, however, I’ll need the tech’s help in re-writing the minutes of footage that I’m inside the office. There isn’t an elegant, nor inconspicuous way to drop from an air vent in to a room without a static camera picking it up.”

“I can do that easy,” Lysithea said, and then turned to Claude. “And don’t worry, they won’t know a thing. It’s not like they’ll know we’ve hacked them if we do it from inside their office on their own computer. Odds are they won’t even notice anything’s happened, and even if they do, they’ll just think it was a hiccup in the system rather than an outside job.”

“I’ll trust you with that, Lys,” Claude patted her on the shoulder and then turned to the team. “OK, I’ll need you all to spend the rest of the day and night preparing for your respective infiltrations – learn the blueprints, perfect your disguises and learn your questions. We set out first thing in the morning to the Varley and Aegir buildings. I’ll book us a nearby hotel, so pack your overnight bags because we’ll be staying up late to complete the night time surveillance heists. Teams are as follows: On the Varley building, I want Hilda leading Ignatz, Caspar, Marianne, Linhardt, and Raphael. I’ll lead the Aegir building team with Lorenz, Lysithea, Leonie, and the newbies. We’ll reconvene to discuss the Hresvelg building once we’ve cleared the first two. Any questions?”

“I have one.” Linhardt raised his hand. Claude nodded at him. “Must Hilda lead us?”

“Yes,” Hilda sneered before Claude could get a word in. “I’m designated second in command, get used to it Sleeping Beauty.”

“But you’re just going to delegate everything and I’m going to have to do twice as much work,” Linhardt groaned.

“That sounds like personal problem. Any personal problems can be taken up with _my_ second in command, Mari. And she is under strict instruction to ignore any and all whiny-baby complaints.” Linhardt grumbled something Claude couldn’t hear which made Caspar chuckle and sling an arm around his shoulder.

“Any _serious_ questions?” Claude asked, waiting for an objection from Felix that never came. He let out a breath. “OK, well. Get to work. Remember, under-cover teams, we’re sticking to asking annoying questions in the hopes of getting someone to slip up and reveal something about security. Not a word about the locket, understood?”

To a chorus of ‘understood’ Claude clapped his hands together and grinned. “In that case, Aegir team, get over here. I want to start planning ASAP. Also, everyone write down a food order, I’ll call it through soon.”

Claude’s team dispersed in to two groups, taking opposite sides of the living room to pour over their respective blueprints. As much as Hilda hated leading, she was a genius when it came to gleaning information from unsuspecting employees – a master at manipulating conversation with a prodigious talent for getting in to a convincing character. She really would have made a fantastic actress had she the energy and drive.

Claude had everyone sit in a cross legged circle around the Aegir building blueprints, and then grinned at Felix and Sylvain. “OK, newbies, you ready to actually do something useful?”

“You bet.” Sylvain found it hard to stop the smile from spreading across his face, and nudged a quiet Felix with his elbow as though inviting him to agree. Felix only offered a grunt in response.

Claude leaned back on his hands, surveying them both. “Sylvain, how good are you at acting?”

“Oh my god. Are you asking me what I think you’re asking me?”

Claude paused. “That definitely depends on what you think I’m asking.”

“Are we going under-cover?”

“You and I are, yes.”

Sylvain made an excited noise and clapped his hands. “What’s our guise? What’s our story? Men in black? Super sexy, rich, mysterious art dealers with tragic back stories?”

“I was thinking more along the lines of horny, erotic writers trying to get their disgusting and unsettlingly filthy novel published.”

Lorenz let out a large sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose, and Sylvain wiped away a fake tear. “That sounds wonderful.”

“What’s that supposed to achieve?” Felix asked. Claude turned to him, half expecting the usual sour-faced disapproval and instead found one of genuine inquisition.

“Our job will be to pester enough employees to read our book that we either get escorted off the premises by their security, or we get taken to their manager to file a complaint. Us being overtly self-confident male erotica authors who genuinely believe their trashy book is a work of art will make it more believable. When we don’t have Hilda to put on her I-want-to-speak-to-the-manager wig, this is the next best thing, trust me. Also, talking about sensitive subjects will not only make staff quicker to pass on our complaint to ease their own awkward suffering, but will also make us resented enough to have the full wrath of their security called down upon us if need be.”

“That’s actually… quite clever,” Felix said, still scowling as though he hated the idea of Claude talking sense.

“Why thank you, Felix, that’s awfully kind of you,” Claude laughed. “But we’ll see if you still think the same when I tell you you’ll be getting in the vents with Lorenz.”

“Excuse me, he’ll be doing _what?_” Lorenz balked. Claude gave Lorenz a thumbs up which was not returned. “You can’t be serious, Claude.”

“Oh I’m deadly serious. I want Felix to go shimmying around the vents of the lower levels in the hopes of overhearing some conversations while you work on the security office. Ignatz told me that security like to wander the halls at night, and you know how much a bored guard likes to talk shit about their boss.”

Lorenz looked exasperated, mouth slightly agape as he tried to process Claude’s words. “Claude,” he pleaded. “I’m not about to babysit a security guard through his first time vent crawling on a mission with stakes as high as these.”

“I don’t ever say things like this lightly, but I agree with Lorenz,” Leonie said. “Couldn’t you send me instead?”

“No, Leonie, I can’t send you. I want the vents to remain in one piece without any boot holes in them.” Claude ignored Leonie’s whined protests and apologies. “Besides, it’ll be fine! Felix is a big strong boy, aren’t you, Felix? And he won’t be alone either - we’ll all be on the communication channel, coaching the baby through his first infiltration.”

Felix clicked his tongue. “I can do it _without_ _your_ help,” he sneered at Lorenz.

“Of course you could,” Lorenz rolled his eyes. “Any idiot could get inside a vent. That doesn’t mean you wouldn’t immediately fall right through it or create enough noise to make the entire building think there was a herd of elephants rampaging above their heads.”

Felix’s face reddened. “Shut up, you pompous—”

“Now, now, kids. Play nice. We’re a team now, remember? Lorenz, I’m going to need you to teach Felix the basics and kit him out with all the necessary gear.”

“Claude—”

“Please, Lorenz? You’re the only one who can do this and I need you both in those vents. We could gain some crucial information, gain the upper hand.”

Lorenz looked as though he wanted to refuse more than anything in the world, his eyes searching Claude’s own for mercy. Claude batted his eyelashes with a cheeky smile, and eventually, Lorenz sighed and steeled his expression, shoulders dropping in defeat. “Fine,” he said. “But if he starts complaining or questioning my tutelage, I reserve the right to decline working with him later.”

“Sounds fair,” Claude shrugged and turned to Felix. “Think you can manage to keep your angry mouth shut for like, an hour or two?”

Felix went to snap something spiteful in reply, but Sylvain nudged him again and he fell silent. “Yes,” he eventually grumbled.

“Great. Then let’s get to work.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> huge thanks to crypttcrawler, sleeplinn, and beepbeeppeep1 on twitter for helping me with the smash references !!!


	5. THE VARLEY BUILDING: PART ONE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> i call this one, bwp (banter without plot)

CHAPTER FIVE: CLAUDE

THE VARLEY BUILDING: PART ONE

Byleth turned up with the bus fifteen minutes late, but Claude had already planned ahead for such an inconvenience and asked them to arrive earlier than he actually intended to leave. It took a great deal of time to get the bus loaded with all of the equipment they would need to complete their respective heists– the tech team’s computers being the most difficult to fit in the suboptimal space that was the luggage compartment - but they eventually all climbed aboard at a respectable hour.

Claude sat up front to catch up with Byleth and Jeritza. It was always fun to hear of their adventures after leaving the retrieval business; they managed to get in to the strangest situations when Claude wasn’t hiring them freelance for their getaway driving expertise, and the stories never failed to keep Claude entertained for the hours they were on the road. He was sure they had experienced enough in their short time travelling to fill quite a lengthy novel.

“Wait, you beat up a fisherman?” Claude found himself asking.

“Correction,” Jeritza held up a finger from his seat opposite Byleth, but did not look up from his phone. “I _disarmed_ a fisherman.”

“He tried to skewer me with a fishing pole because I caught the Legend of the Lake before him,” Byleth said with a lazy shrug. “Apparently, he spent three years just trying to catch a glimpse of the thing, but he had no chance - he wasn’t even using the right bait.”

“In that case, I can’t say I blame him for going slightly feral,” Claude laughed. “Poor guy had probably been there every single day praying to catch a legendary fish, and then some blue-haired cryptid and their husband come along and catch it in five minutes. I’d be inconsolable.”

“Yes, well. He took it a step too far when he accused me of beating him senseless. We spent the next four days trying to outrun an extremely irritable family,” Jeritza said with a look of disdain that painted an amusingly clear picture of their chase in Claude’s mind. “It took us an excruciatingly long time to shake them off. They were… persistent to say the least.”

“It took _you_ a long time to shake them? What, were they a family of bounty hunters or something?”

“Wouldn’t surprise me,” Byleth said and then frowned. “I’m sure we got shot at, at one point.”

Jeritza shook his head and pursed his lips. “No, that was just them throwing food at our car.”

Byleth’s eyes widened comically as they reached some sort of epiphany. “Oh, so _that’s_ what that stain on the window is.”

“I’ve taken it through the car wash three times since, but that grease isn’t going anywhere.” Jeritza clicked his tongue and then lowered his voice to an annoyed drawl. “I’m going to have to get it professionally cleaned.”

“Worth it though, right?” Byleth glanced over at Jeritza with a small smile that Jertiza quickly returned with one of his own.

“Always,” he said.

Claude suddenly felt as though he were intruding on A Moment, so he tactfully averted his gaze to the opposite side window and watched Leicester pass by for a few moments. Splayed out over the two seats behind Jeritza, Claude leaned his head back against his own window, letting the bus’s rumbling vibrations massage his brain as he went over their plan for the twentieth time. “How’s Jeralt doing?” he eventually asked once the silence became too much for him. “He still kicking around in retrievals too?”

Jeralt and Byleth Eisner had been the largest names in retrievals before Claude had entered the scene – an unrivalled team of strength and wit that had returned some of the most priceless antiques and treasures known to Fódlan. Legend had it that they’d even returned an ancient Hero’s relic to the archbishop herself, and though Claude wasn’t sure how true a tale that was, he liked to believe it nonetheless. When he’d first started out, Claude had the opportunity to train under them for a few months, learning the tricks of the trade and gaining crucial experience. It’s where he’d discovered a love and passion for leading, and also where he’d met Leonie, Raphael and Ignatz. The Eisners were like his extended family.

“Huh, I guess so. I haven’t heard from him in a little while since he went over to Brigid on business.”

“Guess he’ll never stop working,” Claude said, thinking of how even when he’d been training under him, Jeralt had been getting on in his years and still been just as lithe and sprightly as the rest of them. “I think he’ll keel over before he puts his suction cups down.”

Byleth made a face. “God, I wish he’d stop using those things. They used to make missions last _forever. _So unnecessary.”

Claude couldn’t suppress the chuckle that bubbled from his chest. “Don’t let Lorenz hear you say that; he swears by those things.”

Byleth’s smile turned wicked and they spared a glance over their shoulder, probably to check on Lorenz’s location before the relentless teasing began. Luckily, or unluckily, Claude wasn’t yet sure, Lorenz was sat towards the back of the bus, still arguing details of the infiltration with Felix, completely out of earshot. Only Marianne and Hilda were close enough to hear their conversation, and they were not only sleeping, but were also already painfully aware of Claude’s situation. It was definitely _unlucky_, Claude decided when Byleth turned their vacant stare on Claude and said, “So how _are_ things with Lorenz? Are you still both relentlessly flirting with each other and doing nothing about it?”

Claude mustered up his most dazzling and unaffected smile. “It would appear that way.”

Jeritza snickered. “Hasn’t the dancing gone on long enough? Aren’t your feet getting tired?”

Claude wanted to say _abso-fucking-lutely_, but decided it would only open up an avenue of conversation he was too tired to traverse with two people who were already in a happy, functioning relationship. “I guess the party and its atmosphere are just too much fun to leave and ruin with that kind of heavy conversation.”

“You are aware that you can get right back to dancing once the conversation is had, right?” Claude caught Byleth raising their eyebrow in the rear view mirror and sighed. It wasn’t as though he hadn’t had this very conversation with nearly every nosy member of the team, but telling Lorenz that he’d been head-over-heels in love with him for the better part of three years was a way more daunting task than anyone ever made it out to be.

“Ah, but will the same song be playing when we return to the dance floor?” Claude asked mirthlessly, having envisioned all sorts of less than ideal outcomes of his own. Most of them ended with a newly strained and painfully awkward relationship between Lorenz and himself. One that threw a metaphorical wrench in to the team’s groove and brought their meticulously built castle crashing to the ground in a pile of rubble and dust.

“Hm, valid point,” Byleth mused. “But you never know – you could come back and find that your favourite is playing instead.”

Claude liked the idea of dancing to his favourite song with Lorenz, if only just to see his face twist in disgust at the raunchy lyrics. But the fact remained that their current rhythm was simply too enjoyable to risk stepping out of time. “When did you become the Professor of Love?” Claude laughed in an attempt to redirect the conversation away from his tumultuous feelings. It wouldn’t do him any good to ruminate on them – he had a job to do, and besides, Claude though he was doing rather OK in his endeavours to win Lorenz’s heart. Even if nobody else believed him.

“My dear Claude, I am the _world’s_ professor. Most are just too afraid to accept the fact.”

“Can’t argue with that, teach. I’ll be sure to file your suggestions away under ‘Do not think about’ until further notice.”

“Suit yourself,” Byleth chuckled. “Not all are wise enough to follow my teachings.”

“Grab a number and join the line of people that have made it their life mission to tell me that,” Claude smirked. “I’m sure Hilda would _love_ to talk to you about how much of her _sage advice_ I’ve ignored over the years.”

Like a demonic spirit summoned at the mention of her name, Hilda stirred from her slumber. She lifted her head carefully from Marianne’s shoulder and pulled herself up to lean her chin on the headrest of Claude’s chair, a daring twinkle in her eye. “What are we talking about?” She feigned innocence, probably having heard the entire conversation under the pretence of faked sleep. “Claude’s inability to get some?”

Claude narrowed his eyes at Hilda. “Why did you even ask if you already knew that was the case?”

“Because my purpose in life is to embarrass you and your purple not-boyfriend.”

Claude put a hand to his chest in mock offence. “You’re my second in command. You’re supposed to act as my wingman, not antagonise me.”

“Who else is gonna do it?” Hilda scoffed. “You two seriously need to lock yourselves in a closet together until you air out all of that sexual tension. We’ll all be better for it.”

“That’s actually a great idea, Hilda,” Byleth chimed in. “You should try it. Works every time.”

“Ooh, maybe I will. Then I’ll finally get to stop hearing Claude whine about how good Lorenz’s ass looks in—”

“OK! That’s quite enough conspiring about my love life. How about we talk about the job we’re getting _paid_ to do?” Claude had more pressing things to worry about after all, like keeping his team alive and out of trouble over the next twenty-four hours.

“Boo, boring!” Hilda slumped back in her seat with a discontent huff, but, despite her gripes, immediately started recounting to Claude in great detail the plan she had constructed for their infiltration of the Varley building. Somehow, Hilda had found the time to go shopping for undercover disguises, despite there already being a multitude of clothes waiting back at headquarters. She’d also been so kind as to offer to buy Claude and Sylvain’s clothing too, but Claude hadn’t had the chance to look at what she’d picked out – a decision he was most definitely going to come to regret once he sauntered in to the Aegir building clad in whatever monstrosity she had chosen. Claude sincerely hoped his trust wasn’t misplaced, but Hilda _did_ have a penchant for embarrassing him, and she wasn’t exactly fond of Sylvain as of yet.

“You’re gonna love what I’ve picked out for you,” Hilda said sweetly, as though reading his mind. “I took inspiration from the disgusting creature that cat-called me on the way to the store.”

Claude grimaced. That did not bode well. 

“It can’t be as bad as the time you dressed up as sexy vegetables for that Halloween heist,” Byleth swiftly reminded them both.

“What do you mean _bad?_” Hilda laughed. “I made those myself. They don’t just go around selling sexy broccoli costumes in regular stores, you know.”

“And I, for one, had a great time as a sexy carrot,” Claude grinned.

The Halloween heist had been one of the strangest cases they’d ever encountered – save for the Acheron case. Fond memories resurfaced of them both stumbling along the street in heels and horrendously tight clothing, near freezing in the late October air, enduring the team’s jaunts in their ear pieces. Even Lorenz had dressed up for the occasion, adorning his usual all-black infiltration gear with cat ears and a matching eye-mask – Claude would personally never forget _that_ as long as he still drew breath. But the pièce de résistance had been the look of utter confusion and horror on their client’s face when they returned to her still clad in their tasteless costumes, safely retrieved, priceless painting tucked under Claude’s orange-painted arm. It had definitely been worth the hours spent jostling hundreds of other half-naked people in an underground club to see it.

Jeritza’s face contorted first in to disgust, and then swiftly moved on to confusion. “How do you even _become_ a sexy carrot?”

“It’s all in the legs,” Claude winked.

Jeritza’s face twisted again. “I should not have asked.”

Eventually, work-related chat dissolved in to Hilda convincing Jeritza to fix her broken car once they got back home, and Claude let himself relax against the window once more. He ran over the plan for the millionth time, ironing out any creases, planning ahead for any unforeseen miscalculations. One could never be over-prepared for a heist; the unexpected tended to creep up on those who did not adequately prepare, and Claude would be caught dead before he got caught without a backup plan.

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

\--HILDA--

Hilda hopped out of the bus with a skip in her step, finally glad to rid her legs of the awful cramp that had seized them during the two-hour long journey. Hopefully with all this money they were getting pumped with to get Dimitri’s ugly locket back, they’d finally be able to afford a bus that had enough room for her to stretch her legs out comfortably. And one that didn’t have a lingering background odour of piss. It wasn’t likely, since Claude preferred to reinvest their funds in to the areas of their team that were more pressing and desperate, but a girl could definitely dream.

At least Claude had booked them in to a decent hotel – the outside looked pretty ritzy, but Hilda supposed that was probably commonplace in an upper-class area of Adrestia like Gronder. It definitely looked like the kind of place that would have a spa inside just _waiting_ to be taken advantage of. If everything went by smoothly enough, maybe she could convince Marianne to join her for some treatments once all of this heist business was over with.

“Jeritza and Byleth are going to go and rent some cars,” Claude explained, switching easily in to his leader voice. “When they get back, we’ll be splitting off in to our teams to begin phase one of our investigations. Team Hilda,” he said, eyes catching Hilda’s own for a moment before sweeping over the rest of the team. “I want you all to listen to and respect Hilda as your new boss. Her word is final, and on my authority, she is legally allowed to kill anyone who dares disobey her. I’m looking at _you,_ Caspar.”

Behind Claude’s back, Hilda sent Caspar a sly grin, not unlike the one she would send her brother upon getting him in to trouble with their parents as kids. Caspar huffed out a, “Yes, boss,” before turning and sneering back at Hilda. She couldn’t wait to get him in to costume later – he was definitely going to love her a whole lot more than he already did.

“Keep your phones on, and stay in contact with each other. We’ll all meet back in Lorenz and I’s room later to relay our findings and make any subsequent changes to our infiltration plans.”

Hilda made it a point to catch Claude’s eye and raise a suggestive eyebrow at the mention of his shared room with Lorenz, but he only offered her an eye roll in return. Claude could play as dumb as he wanted - Hilda _knew_ he was working his way through the book of rom-com clichés in the hope that one of them might work out in his favour. He’d have to fall on the whole ‘locked in a closet’ scenario eventually, and Hilda would be readily waiting with the key and a bucket of popcorn when he finally came grovelling for help.

“Team Hilda! Gather round,” she called, beckoning to the members of her new team while Claude’s followed him in to the hotel. “Go get unpacked or whatever and then come to my room. Also, bring snacks, or you’re not allowed in.”

The hotel reception was even larger than Hilda had imagined it would be. It was an opulently decorated building, infinitely spacious and bright – as though royalty should have lived there - with large, intricately carved pillars holding up the ceiling, and a fountain splashing quietly as a startling centrepiece. There was probably more decadence packed in to this one building than she’d seen in the past five years, jumping from building to building every time Claude compromised their super-secret address.

After elbowing her way to the front of the line, it took Hilda a mere ten minutes to get her room key. Grabbing her bags, and Marianne’s hand, she led the charge to their room, eager to see if it was as impressive as she had been imagining. She’d never let Claude rest if he _hadn’t_ booked her in to a room with a view, especially not when there was simply _so much_ view to be viewed.

With a quiet _click_ the room key let them inside, and Hilda took back all the curses she’d attached to Claude’s name in the event that the room was substandard, because he’d quite possibly gotten them the most charming, beautiful suite imaginable.

“I might just stage a coup and oust Claude for good if it means that as a leader I’ll always get rooms as nice as this,” Hilda sighed, spinning around once the door had closed behind them to take in all in. A huge, four-poster bed sat proudly against the wall; heavy curtains were tied back to the posts to reveal a mattress so soft-looking that Hilda was getting tired just _imagining_ sleeping on it. Nearby, perched in front of a large bay window overlooking a gorgeously kept garden in full bloom, was a plush sofa of pink velvet, fit with gold trimmings and cushions, expertly matched to the shade of pink surrounding, and covering their bed. Delicate glass furnishings brought the whole room together, topped with vases of freshly picked flowers and bowls of ripened fruit that made the whole room smell divine.

“It's beautiful, isn’t it?” Marianne sighed, gazing out of the window upon the gardens. “I don’t think I’ve ever stayed in a place so fancy.”

Hilda joined her, snaking her arms around Marianne’s waist and rocking up on to her tip toes to rest her chin on Marianne’s shoulder. She was wearing Hilda’s favourite perfume – a delicate blend of roses that Hilda had deemed her favourite of Marianne’s collection. “What do you think about making this our wedding venue? We could use those gardens for the ceremony.”

Marianne gasped softly, turning her head slightly to catch Hilda’s eye. It had been a few months since Hilda had proposed – a quiet affair during one of their monthly candlelit picnics – but they hadn’t yet found the time to make any solid plans. It felt like fate that they had been brought to such a gorgeous setting. “Really? Are you sure we can afford such a place?”

“I’d do a million jobs myself to make it possible, if it would make you happy,” Hilda grinned.

Marianne giggled and leaned back in to Hilda’s embrace. “You’d really do all of that work just for me?”

“No task is too troublesome if it brings a smile to my darling Mari’s face,” Hilda cooed, pressing a kiss to Marianne’s cheek. And she meant it too – were anyone else to ask her for a favour of any kind, she’d very happily redirect them to someone else who could complete it with actual enthusiasm. But for Marianne, no task seemed too menial or insignificant. No request was too taxing. A rewarding smile from Marianne was motivation enough to move a mountain if need be.

“Would it please you too? We both have to like it after all,” she said, turning around entirely to face Hilda, a small line worrying itself in to her forehead.

Hilda reached up and smoothed it away with her fingers. “Nothing would please me more,” she said softly. “Just _thinking_ about how beautiful you would look surrounded by all of those flowers is already bringing me close to tears.”

Marianne’s cheeks turned as pink as the sofa, and Hilda beamed, dropping her hands to capture Marianne’s. With a laugh, Hilda twirled Marianne around, the white chiffon of her skirt fanning out, and making Hilda’s heart leap with how closely it resembled a wedding dress. It still felt unbelievable that she’d found someone so beautiful and so wonderful - someone who she cared for so deeply and profoundly, that she thought she might finally understand what all of those old poets were talking about. For a moment, they simply swayed to non-existent music, Hilda holding Marianne close in their hotel suite made for princesses.

It wasn’t until a thunderous knock on their door startled them apart that Hilda remembered they were actually here on business.

“Are you gonna let us in or what? I brought Doritos!” Caspar’s voice sounded from beyond the door, accompanied by more horrifically loud banging. Hilda tried to ignore it, turning back to Marianne, intent on continuing their little romantic dance, but then Caspar started banging louder, and shouting profanities in the corridor.

“I’ll kill that child one day,” Hilda growled, storming over to the door and throwing it open.

Caspar stopped mid-knock, one hand hovering in place, the other clutching several bags of Doritos. At least he’d adhered to her snack rule. “Finally—”

“Shut the fuck up and get inside before you get us thrown out!”

Caspar had the audacity to look affronted. “OK, jeez! No need to get so angry about it.”

“I can do whatever I want. I’m the boss.” Hilda ushered them inside, leaving the door slightly ajar for the rest of the team so she wouldn’t have to get back up to let them in. “Actually, I’m calling upon my divine power and I hereby ban you from talking for the next three hours.”

“What? You can’t do that!” He turned to Linhardt who was standing behind him, face completely unfazed by the entire conversation. Why couldn’t more people be like Linhardt? “Can she do that?” he asked him.

Linhardt offered a shrug. “Probably. Not as though there’s anything we can do about it.”

“This is so unfair! How am I supposed to go under cover if I’m not allowed to talk?”

Hilda snatched one of his bags of Doritos and opened it up, falling down on to the softness of the pink sofa. “I don’t know.” She popped one in to her mouth and let the crunch speak for itself. “How are you still talking when I clearly just prohibited you from opening your huge mouth?”

Caspar pouted, crossing his arms over his chest as though scowling in protest might guilt Hilda in to lifting her ban. It wouldn’t make a shred of difference, however. The kid could make as many faces as he liked, it wasn’t going to change her mind - Hilda was going to make him pay for interrupting her time with Marianne. Regardless of whether or not she had explicitly invited him to her room.

Soon after, Raph and Ignatz also appeared; Raphael carrying two large shopping bags full of snacks and Ignatz struggling to keep a hold of several rolled up blueprints, a box of wires, and a laptop. Raphael kept sending him worried glances, as though he had offered assistance on several occasions, but Ignatz’s face was set with determination as he shouldered open the door and threw everything atop Hilda and Marianne’s immaculately turned out bed.

“OK, dipshits-minus-Marianne, gather round.” Hilda got up and brought everyone together to convene on the bed, heaving her bag of clothes along with her. Ignatz immediately rolled out the blueprints corresponding to the Varley building in the centre of their makeshift circle, and then sat back, handing Linhardt a laptop before powering up his own. “Mari, Caspar, and I will be going to the Varley building as soon as Jeritza is ready to pick us up. In the meantime, nerd crew will gather as much information as they can before the night time infiltration. We probably won’t have to do much, but we’ll try to get as much info on the night time security situation as we can. You can at least see what the inside looks like during the day time with our cameras.”

“That would be extremely beneficial,” Ignatz nodded. “While it’s unlikely that anyone will remain inside the building after dark, we cannot be absolutely sure. Especially not since we know there’s been suspicious activity going on inside as of late. We’ll need to remain as cautious as we can and try not to bump in to any guards, especially since we’ll be operating without Lorenz’s expertise.”

“_Pfft._ We don’t need Lorenz,” Hilda scoffed. “We’re _Team Hilda. _We’re the best of the best. If you see anyone, just taser them until they fall down, and carry on about your business.”

“I thought the tasers were supposed to be a last resort,” Raphael frowned.

“Don’t be such a baby, Raph,” Hilda rolled her eyes and flipped her hair over her shoulder, moving to unzip her disguise bag. Typical Raphael – too kind for his own good. If Hilda didn’t already know he was only doing this job to provide for his little sister, she’d have questioned him on why he was even here at all. “I don’t know what you’re so worried about, anyway. You could literally crush their skulls with your bare hands.”

“That doesn’t mean I _want_ to.”

“What’s the point in all those muscles if you don’t even pulverise people with them.” Hilda shook her head and Caspar nodded solemnly in agreement. “Such a waste.”

“If I may also add,” Linhardt raised a finger.

“No, you may not.”

Linhardt made a face and continued regardless. “Claude put us under strict instruction not to draw any attention to ourselves.”

“Yeah, well, Claude’s a baby too. And I’m telling you, if you run in to trouble, you taser them and run. What did Claude say to you all not half an hour ago?” She waited for a response, but the room remained silent. “I’m not hearing my answer,” she snapped.

“Hilda’s word is final,” they all chanted in depressing unison.

“That’s right. Now, moving swiftly on,” she smiled, emptying her bag of clothes out on to the Varley blueprints. Ignatz yelped as the paper creased beneath the pile, but thought better of trying to rescue it when Hilda began talking again. “Let’s go over the plan once more. Mari and I will be walking in to the Varley building with our darling son Caspar to personalise and purchase some invitations for his fourteenth birthday party.”

Caspar made a noise, clearly shocked at the change in details that they had agreed upon the night before, but, to his credit, still diligently following the ‘no-talking’ rule.

“Sorry, Caspar,” Marianne said. “It’s more believable this way.”

“Yeah, nobody’s gonna believe you’re a professional gamer looking to print out invites to your--” Hilda narrowed her eyes, pretending to read something on the palm of her hand. “‘Epic gamer party’.”

Caspar looked as though he was battling with something internally for a while, face contorting in to all manners of emotions. “Permission to speak?” he eventually asked, voice strained.

Hilda pondered it for a moment, and then decided it would be way more entertaining to hear his outraged protests on this matter, than to watch him quietly fume. “Permission granted for three minutes.”

“Wow, that’s not long. OK, uh. _Yes they totally fucking will!”_

Hilda lowered her voice slightly in a mocking imitation. “Uh, _no they totally fucking won’t. _They especially won’t believe that Marianne and I are your_ managers._”

“Whatever,” Caspar spat, grabbing one of the bags of marshmallows that Raphael had brought along, and tearing in to it with a furious frown. “Why didn’t you just tell me yesterday? I got so hyped up for this,” he said around a mouthful of sugar.

“Because agreeing with you got you to shut up quicker. Now put your Fortnite t-shirt on, son.”

Caspar picked up his disguise and looked upon the clothing as though it carried a contagious disease. “How the hell am_ I_ supposed to pass for a fourteen-year-old? There’s no way I look that young. I look at least… seventeen.”

Even Ignatz could not contain a chuckle. “You got ID’d for a lottery ticket. Not even _I_ get ID’d for those,” he said with an amused smile.

“Hey! That was only because it was dark and they couldn’t see my face clearly.”

“You keep telling yourself that,” Hilda laughed. “Also, time’s up.”

“But it hasn’t even been—”

“Time. Is. Up.” Caspar’s shoulders slouched and he closed his mouth again, throwing himself backwards to rest against the bed’s headboard. Linhardt offered him a sympathetic pat on the shoulder and shuffled closer to lean against him in solidarity. “Aw, how cute,” Hilda cooed and watched with glee as Caspar shut up for real this time to hide a blush. It seemed the only thing that ever got him to quieten down naturally was Linhardt. Hilda was glad they’d come as a package deal.

“Would you like me to continue, Hilda?” Marianne asked, looking and sounding like an angel sent from the goddess herself.

“Ugh, yes please. All this talking is exhausting,” Hilda groaned and grabbed one of Raphael’s bottles of flavoured water to ease her parched throat. She couldn’t fathom how Claude did it so effortlessly. Leading was tiring and annoying, and if the title wouldn’t automatically be passed down to _Lorenz_ by default, Hilda might have relinquished the privilege altogether. As it stood, she’d honestly rather die than be bossed around by Lorenz and his albeit improved, yet no less lingering superiority complex.

“Very well,” Marianne smiled knowingly, soft voice soothing and musical as she ran through the rest of the plan. Hilda closed her eyes as she listened, and thought that Marianne could probably recite something as mundane as the phonebook and she would still find it beautifully captivating.

When she had finished to the sound of the team’s approval, Hilda took back the charge. “Marianne, Caspar and I are going to get changed. Linhardt and Ignatz, go and get the cameras and earpieces ready. Raphael, keep looking handsome.”

“Can do, boss,” Raphael beamed.

“Let’s get this shit started.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

“Linhardt, please don’t look at me. I’m hideous,” Caspar groaned, crossing his arms over his chest in an attempt to hide his costume. Hilda thought she’d done a pretty stellar job at making him look like a teenager again. His hair had been easy to mess up – some tap water had dampened it enough to look unwashed and unkempt – and his Fortnite shirt and baggy jeans drowned him, hiding the bulk of his muscles. The look was completed with a battered phone in one hand, a half-empty can of Monster in the other, and an ungodly amount of body spray. Hilda applied the finishing touches to his hair thinking she probably could have made it big in Hollywood had she not gotten too attached to this team of miscreants.

“You hardly look different than you usually do,” Linhardt said with a genuinely puzzled expression. He wasn’t wrong, either - other than a skinnier pair of jeans and a different graphic tee, Caspar looked largely the same. He wasn’t exactly a paragon of fashion.

Caspar covered his face with his hands and sunk down on to the bed. “Oh my _god_, that’s the worst thing you’ve ever said to me.”

“Was that a bad thing to say? I thought you looked rather cute.”

“You’re only saying that because you’re legally obliged to as my boyfriend. It’s OK. You don’t have to pretend. I know it looks awful.”

“Oh thank god, OK. I hate lying to you,” Linhardt sighed, and then turned to Hilda. “How on earth did you manage to make _Caspar_ look bad?”

Hilda wanted to say something like ‘_I hardly even did anything,’ _or _‘He just has that natural chaotic energy,’ _but much preferred the idea of her talents being revered instead. “I am simply _that_ talented,” she shrugged. “I mean look at me. I’ve somehow managed to _not_ look sexy. I deserve a medal or something.”

Hilda’s own outfit was one of her least favourites, and no matter how much Claude praised her ‘I-want-to-speak-to-the-manager’ disguise, she would never feel anything less than rotten with all of her long, pink hair tucked up in to an atrociously cut blonde bobbed wig, and banging body hidden under an ugly cardigan and three-quarter jean shorts. At least Marianne still looked pretty in her floral sun dress and considerably nicer wig of long brown curls. At least _someone_ in the family was attractive.

Caspar continued to groan and complain right up until Jeritza knocked on Hilda’s door; at which point he swiftly changed moods and started pestering Jeritza excitedly about his workout routine all the way down to the carpark. The car that Jeritza had picked up was a… black one? Hilda wasn’t even sure what the types of cars were called, but it looked nice nevertheless, and Caspar had a lot of good things to say about it.

The inside was nice too – Hilda sank in to the soft leather seat next to Marianne, too tired to argue with Caspar over the front. It was probably for the best that she was farther away from Caspar’s incessant interrogation of Jeritza anyway – there was only so much she could listen to talk about protein shakes and whatever the fuck plyometric push ups were, before physically wanting to throw herself out of the car window.

Once the car had gotten settled on the road towards the Varley building, Hilda instructed everyone to turn on their earpieces and cameras. The device made a small _beeping_ sound in Hilda’s ear, and then gave way to a light crackle of static before Ignatz’s voice came ringing through.

“_Hilda, if you can hear me, cough three times.” _Hilda did as instructed. “_Fantastic. You’re all set up. OK, Marianne, you next. Cough three times.” _Marianne coughed, and then Caspar followed, hacking in to his microphone to the absolute disgust of everybody listening. “_OK, we’re good to go. We can hear and see everything perfectly on our end.”_

“Great work, Iggy,” Hilda said, pulling out her phone. “Now, Linhardt. Tell me how this app of yours works.”

Hilda could hear shuffling on the other end of the line, and then Linhardt’s lazy voice. “_Once you enter the building, pull open the app, and it should direct you to the locations of all known security cameras. This’ll be more so for Caspar once he wanders off, but if you want to avoid your faces being seen, use the app and keep your backs to the cameras.”_

_“_Wow, this is unbelievable. How did you even get this to work, Linhardt?” Marianne asked, peering over at Hilda’s phone. As of right now, the screen was nothing but a zoomed out map, constantly moving along with the pace of the car. But when Hilda tapped one of the random, passing buildings, she was immediately brought to the lowest level’s floor plans, and the locations all of the subsequent security cameras.

“_That’s not really important,_” Linhardt said flippantly.

“So it was probably illegal. I like it,” Hilda nodded, and then frowned when realisation dawned upon her. “Why the hell haven’t you sold this to someone? You could probably make enough money from this alone to live comfortably for the rest of your life. Why are you wasting it on us?”

Linhardt scoffed over the line. _“My research is purely for my own personal interest. I have no desire to sell my inventions, nor do I ever want to work for someone else, and be confined in to one endlessly boring way of thinking.”_

“Sounds like bullshit to me,” Hilda said. “You could be a billionaire.”

_“Ah yes, how utterly enticing. To be a horrific leech upon society.”_

“Oh geez,” Caspar said from the front. “This conversation is really going there.”

“_Regardless,” _Linhardt cut in. “_This app should make things easier for you. You can also update the floor plans if you find anything of interest that the infiltration team should know about – any cameras, deviances in the blueprints, or locations of any current guards that might stick around after dark.”_

“Have you told Claude about this? He’s probably going to piss himself in excitement.” Hilda wasn’t exaggerating either – _god_ she wished she could have been there to see his reaction. The first time they’d ever operated using earpieces, he’d almost cried. This was likely to cause an emotional breakdown.

“_I was actually going to tell him about it once this conversation was over, and then nap until I’m needed. So if we’re all done here, I’ll just leave you to it.”_

“Sweet dreams, Linhardt!” Caspar called over the line.

“_Stay safe, Caspar.”_

“Of course I will! There’s no need to worry about me, Lin. I’m an undercover _master._”

Hilda bit back a thousand replies to that statement, each and every one pertaining to Caspar almost blowing their cover entirely due to his inability to not only keep his mouth shut, but also keep his fists to himself. Poor Jeritza also didn’t deserve to have his ear blown to smithereens in the front seat when Caspar inevitably argued back.

The unmistakable shuffling sound of Linhardt removing his earpiece and leaving the hotel room signalled an end to the conversation, and Hilda leaned back in to the softness of the leather seat to watch Gronder fade in to Varley, and to focus on embodying the passions and beliefs of a forty-year-old white woman named Karen.

\--CASPAR—

Caspar wasn’t one for bragging, but he was quite possibly the best undercover agent Claude had in his arsenal. Hilda and Lorenz would _definitely_ disagree, as would most of the other members of the team, now that he thought about it. Hell, even Linhardt probably thought Caspar’s strengths laid elsewhere. But Caspar believed in in himself, and that was why he definitely was _not_ feeling as though he might die of embarrassment. No, definitely not. Not even when Hilda and Marianne grabbed his hands announced that he was their ‘darling baby son’ to the woman at the front desk of the Varley building.

“We were going to order them online, you know?” Hilda said in her best attempt at a motherly accent. It didn’t sound half bad, Caspar was loathe to admit. “But our darling baby son was just so excited about his party invitations, he wanted to get them as soon as possible.”

“Only the best for our baby,” Marianne smiled in affirmation and ruffled Caspar’s hair. Ignatz laughed over the communication.

“Yeah, I get you,” the woman at the front desk said; she sounded bored, like she’d been here all day and they were the first people to come in. Caspar made desperate eye contact with her in the hopes that she might see through the façade and affirm that he didn’t, in fact, look like a fourteen-year-old. “Take a seat and I’ll get you an appointment with one of our artists.”

“Fantastic,” Hilda beamed. “Come along, Kyle.”

Caspar grunted and dragged his feet along, slumping in one of the reception chairs with a scowl. There was no way his disguise was believable! No way! He was twenty-two-years-old! He’d worked so hard to gain all of that muscle, no dumb little kid could be as absolutely shredded as the very-much-an-adult Caspar! _Someone_ had to see through it.

“_Wow, you’re really committing to this whole method acting thing, Caspar,” _Ignatz chided. “_You’ve got the moody teenager look down so well.”_

“I’m not act—” Hilda had to pinch him to stop him from announcing to the reception that he was undercover. He tactfully closed his mouth.

“This building sure is pretty, isn’t it Marlene?” Hilda asked Marianne loud enough for everyone to hear. “It looks so antique. Hey, Miss, how old do you reckon this place is? It must be at least a hundred-years-old, right?”

The receptionist looked up with a withered expression that screamed ‘_I would rather die than talk to you about this.’_ “I don’t know, ma’am. I just work the phone.”

Hilda tutted and removed her boxy sunglasses from her atop her head to thread them on to her shirt. “Such a shame these days that kids aren’t interested in our wonderful history.” She turned to Caspar. “I bet you’d know if you worked here, wouldn’t you, Kyle? You’re so bright and clever.”

Caspar groaned and sent an apologetic look towards the receptionist. Hilda really liked to go overboard when she became Karen. “Stop embarrassing me, _mom._”

“It’s not embarrassing to be clever, sweetie. Honestly, kids these days, you can’t say anything to them. Was I being embarrassing, my dear Marlene? I don’t think I was, was I?”

“Not at all, darling,” Marianne hummed, and then launched them in to a boring conversation about their non-existent garden.

Caspar groaned again and buried his face in his hands, using Hilda’s overbearing motherly attitude and as an excuse to pull out his phone and start up Linhardt’s app. It loaded almost immediately, and Caspar raised an eyebrow at his phone’s sudden responsiveness. They’d beaten his case in to a scratched mess, but the phone itself was working as though it was brand new. Whatever Linhardt had done when Caspar had relinquished it to his experiments, had turned it in to some kind of super-phone. It was loading faster than it had ever done in its entire life.

The app made a small noise, and then brought up the current floor plan of the Varley building. One red dot blinked repeatedly in the upper left hand corner of the map, and Caspar disguised a glance at the corresponding camera with a stretch and a yawn. _God_ he was so good at this – he’d even managed to get the camera attached to his shirt to point in its direction, something that Ignatz would no doubt be grateful for.

“Karen Smith?” a woman with long brown hair emerged from behind a door to say. Caspar couldn’t help but think she looked way too much like a celebrity to be working somewhere as mundane as a printing office.

Hilda immediately got up at the mention of her undercover name, and beamed at the woman. “That’s me,” she said, and then turned to Marianne and Caspar with a grin. “Are you excited, sweetheart?”

“Yeah,” Caspar muttered and dug his hands in to his pockets to follow his mothers in to the woman’s office. It was a small room, only housing a few chairs, a desk, a computer, and the largest printer Caspar had ever seen. It didn’t differ at all to floor plans the app had described, even down to the placement of the small, latched window and lack of security camera.

“My name’s Dorothea,” the woman said, voice relaxed, yet musical as she settled herself in to the seat behind her desk. Definitely a celebrity’s voice. Caspar was going to have to look her name up to be sure. “We don’t usually get walk-ins, so forgive me if everything is a bit of a mess.”

“That’s not a problem,” Marianne said. “We understand it’s short notice, but our precious boy just couldn’t wait any longer.”

“I know how it is. Kids are always so eager,” Dorothea smiled and then turned to Caspar with a condescending smile that probably should have been saved for a baby. “So I hear it’s your birthday coming up, young man! How old will you be turning?”

When Caspar didn’t respond immediately and let the room hang in an uncomfortable silence, Hilda nudged him in the side. “Come on, Kyle, tell the nice lady how old you’ll be.”

Caspar wanted to explode. “Fourteen,” he grumbled.

“Wow! That’s a great age,” Dorothea said wistfully. “And you’re so tall, too!”

“He’s the tallest in his year group,” Hilda boasted, and Ignatz cackled on the other end of the line. He had some nerve! Ignatz was even shorter than Caspar. If anyone should have been dressed up as a kid enduring _this_ humiliation, it should have been _him._ Curse him for being tactically minded or whatever, and being ‘required elsewhere’. Caspar fumed quietly, praying that he could keep his composure long enough not to ruin their guise this time.

“Now that is lucky! The goddess of good genes really must have favoured you, huh?”

“I guess,” Caspar muttered, attributing his rapidly deflating mood to his characterisation of a teenager.

“Oh, but you’re so quiet! It’s OK, don’t be shy. We’ll make you the most fantastic party invites you’ve ever seen! All of your friends will be utterly blown away.”

To Caspar’s absolute _relief_, Dorothea stopped questioning him for a brief spell to look at something on her computer. She was nice, Caspar realised with a hint of guilt. It really would be a shame to watch Hilda unleash the beast upon her during Phase Two. Still, he didn’t feel guilty enough to forgo the plan. With practiced indifference, Caspar kept pulling his phone from his pocket to check the time, eager to put the next part of said plan in to action. He needed to do something other than be babied before he truly burst in to uncontrollable flame and took the whole building down with him.

_“Not yet, Caspar,”_ Ignatz’s voice came through the earpiece as though somehow reading his mind. Caspar huffed and leaned down to retie his shoelaces, but instead of actually doing so, he angled the camera towards his hands beneath the table, and sent Ignatz a clear picture of his middle finger. “_Oh, that’s real nice, Cas. Guess you really are fourteen, huh?” _Caspar changed his middle finger to an obscene jerk-off gesture.

“_Caspar, that’s so rude.” _Raphael sounded saddened by Caspar’s behaviour, which, in itself was also sad, because nobody liked to disappoint Raphael. _“If I was your father, I’d ground you for at least an hour.” _Emboldened at the continuation of his babyfication, Caspar increased the intensity of the gesture and added some special effects with his other hand.

“Are you OK under there, _son?_” Marianne’s voice came from above the table, and Caspar startled, hitting his head on the desk.

“Oh! Uh, yeah. Just tying my shoes,” he said, rubbing the newly forming lump.

“OK, well, go on and tell Miss Dorothea what it was that you wanted on your invite.”

Dorothea smiled at him, notebook and pen poised ready to take down his notes. Caspar drew in a breath, and reluctantly started reciting the practised speech he’d formed back at the hotel, precisely timed voice cracks and all. He said something or other about Fortnite, something about other well-known video games, and then threw in some various titbits of knowledge he could remember about football for good measure. “I also want the writing to be like, silver and sparkly,” he added, hoping it would be enough to replicate the usage of the ink from the Flame Emperor’s card. Linhardt would be glad to test and compare the two inks, no doubt.

“That sounds wonderful. We can definitely get this done within the next few hours. Now I’ll just need to have a little chat with your mothers about dimensions and payment.”

“Yeah,” Caspar grunted, and then heard Ignatz’s signal in his ear. “Actually, does this place have a bathroom? I need to go.”

“Of course,” Dorothea said. “The one on the bottom floor is currently out of order, but if you take the stairs up to the second floor, you’ll find one at the end of the corridor.”

Of course, Caspar already knew all of this information, thanks to Ignatz and Linhardt’s research, but he pretended to listen carefully to Dorothea’s instruction anyway, and then left Hilda and Marianne alone with her to chat. As soon as he got out in to the fresh air of the corridor, Caspar mashed his fists together and let out the largest sigh known to humankind.

“_Please don’t start screaming in the hallways,”_ Ignatz said. “_We don’t want to get thrown out by security yet._”

“Shut up,” Caspar muttered under his breath.

“_Hurry up, you don’t have long before you’ll start to raise suspicion.”_

Caspar bit his tongue, and started a brisk pace for the stairwell. His task was not actually to _find_ the bathroom, but rather to accidentally stumble in to the security office under the guise of _looking_ for the bathroom. The plans showed that it was situated somewhere along the second floor’s hallway of doors, but which door exactly, remained a mystery left for Caspar to solve.

With the app left open, Caspar ascended the steps two at a time and then found himself staring down the empty hallway. The sound of machines whirring, and shuffling paper filled the air in a dull, yet distant monotonous drone from behind the doors. Staring at the actual hallway was definitely different than simply staring at the plans and concocting a mental image. Each and every door looked identical – not one seemed to stand out or scream ‘security’, much to Caspar’s annoyance. It would be a whole lot easier if it did.

“_Listen out for a room with no printers inside,” _Ignatz offered by way of sensible suggestion. Caspar cocked his head to the side – that was actually really clever. His plan had been to just open each and every door and apologise for entering the wrong one until he found the correct one. This way would definitely stop him from getting escorted directly to the bathroom, effectively ending the reconnaissance mission.

“Uh, yeah, duh. I was already doing that,” Caspar lied, keeping his voice to a harsh whisper.

Keeping close to the doors, Caspar kept his ear near the dark wood, listening for a lull in the sound of machinery. He had to be wary – there was a camera located at the end of the hall, and he had to be sure not to look as though he were snooping. It was harder than he would have thought, to act lost despite knowing exactly what he was looking for.

The first three rooms he passed were too loud – voices mixed with the mundane background noise, and Caspar could even hear the details of the meaningless conversations about work and paper density as he went. The next two passed by largely the same, though Caspar had to stop for a second near one door in particular until the familiar sound of another machine sputtered to life and started meticulously printing in a hypnotic rhythm.

He took his chances with the sixth room. By outward appearances, it seemed almost dead inside. He even stopped to retie his shoelaces again in order to press his ear even closer to the door just to be sure. Not a single sound. Caspar straightened back up and wiped his sweaty palms on his jeans before turning the handle and walking, with the utmost confidence, inside.

Luckily, he'd struck gold.

“Hey, kid, what are you doing in here?”

“Oh, this isn’t the bathroom,” Caspar said, stepping in and giving the camera the best view he could manage. The security guard had been sitting in a chair, pouring over multiple monitors – he technically should have seen Caspar coming. Maybe he simply wasn’t paying attention. Maybe he’d been sleeping - Caspar definitely couldn’t blame him for that. Surveillance was the most _boring_ job on earth. Either way, it definitely worked in their favour – being bestowed with a lazy guard.

“No,” the guard said tersely. Then, when he realised Caspar was ‘just a child’, and not a potential threat, softened his gaze and slackened his posture. “Bathroom’s at the end of the hall, kid.”

“Thanks, sir,” Caspar said. “Sorry to… uh…disturb you.”

“No problem, stay out of trouble, yeah?”

“Of course,” Caspar grinned, and then pulled out his phone on the way to the bathroom, loading up Linhardt’s app to mark room number six as the room to infiltrate. “Got em’,” Caspar said to Ignatz.

“_Nice work, Caspar.”_

_Hell yeah_, Caspar thought. Nice work indeed.


	6. THE VARLEY BUILDING: PART TWO

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oof sorry this took a while. pokemon happened

CHAPTER SIX: HILDA

THE VARLEY BUILDING: PART TWO

Dorothea was nice. So, _so,_ nice. So nice, in fact, that Hilda was seriously reconsidering whether or not the last part of the plan was worth enacting at all. Karen, once unleashed, was a hard beast to tame, and Hilda often found herself getting lost in the character, wreaking havoc on all in her path like a vengeful dragon, stopping at nothing until she had scorched entire cities to cinders. The last time she’d used Karen, she’d all but forgotten the atrocities she’d committed until Marianne had shaken her awake and the entire building’s security team were escorting her off the premises. Dorothea didn’t deserve that. Not many people did.

“There we go, that’s all sorted for you. The printing process might take a little while. If you’d like to leave me your phone number, you can wait in a café nearby until they’re ready to pick up,” Dorothea beamed, handing Hilda back her credit card, her smile pretty, polite and practiced.

No, she _definitely_ didn’t deserve it. But then, Hilda didn’t want to abandon the latter half of the plan either. Instead, to settle the guilt warring inside her stomach like a swarm of bees, and justify the oncoming devastation, she imagined Dorothea making kittens cry, or babies sad, or something equally as heinous.

“That sounds wonderful,” Hilda said, working extremely hard to hide the grimace that threatened to overtake her features. Walking the rich streets of Varley in the most hideous outfit she’d ever put upon her body wasn’t exactly Hilda’s idea of fun, but she could bring that complaint up with Claude later. It was always so much easier to blame Claude for her inconveniences. “Thanks so much for your help, Dorothea, you’re an angel.”

“Oh that’s not a problem, it was my pleasure. You’re such an adorable little family.”

_Twist the knife deeper why don’t you?_

Hilda cringed, mouth twisting in to a fake smile. “Aren’t you are just the sweetest little thing? Are you sure they pay you enough here?”

Dorothea laughed and waved her off. “I’m quite happy here, I assure you.”

Of _course_ she was happy here. It would be too easy if Dorothea were aggravated about her workplace enough to start griping about the building and its staff. _Way_ too easy. All of Hilda’s previous attempts to glean any sort of information had ended in similar ways – with Dorothea’s tight-lipped praise of the company. Maybe they were brainwashing her. No company was kind enough to warrant actual _praise_ from its staff, at least not without a telling twitch of the eyebrow, or a wink and a nudge.

“Well that’s great,” Hilda smiled and jotted down her temporary mobile number on a piece of paper. “Because I’d be sure to give the manager a piece of my mind if you weren’t.”

“I appreciate your concern, but the manager and I are actually friends,” Dorothea said, and for the first time since stepping in to the Varley building, Hilda actually felt as though she might be on the cusp of some _useful_ information.

Which was probably more than what she could say for Caspar. Wherever the fuck he was. Ten whole minutes had passed and he was still ‘on the toilet’. If Hilda were his real mother, she’d have stormed off after him and dragged him back by his ear by now. The communication line had also gone suspiciously quiet, most likely a safety precaution on Ignatz’s part which meant that either something very good or something disastrously bad was going on. Knowing Caspar, it was the latter.

But for how much Hilda griped about Caspar’s existence, it certainly would be quiet without him should he have found himself locked up in a prison cell for trespassing. She sincerely hoped that wasn’t the case; it would be like losing a very loud, very annoying, very lovable little brother. Never mind the fact that Claude would never let Hilda live another peaceful day for the rest of her life, were Caspar were to go down under her watch.

“Oh? Well that’s nice,” Marianne supplied before Hilda forgot to answer entirely. “I suppose it makes the job more enjoyable when you’re surrounded by friends.”

“Bernadetta actually wanted to make me a co-manager,” Dorothea said in an uncharacteristic bout of divulgence. She tapped a few keys on her computer’s keyboard and then sat back in her seat, the printer behind her jumping to life with a loud whirr of machinery. “But I told her I was happier designing and she made me the Head of Department instead. She’s such a kind soul.”

_Oh no,_ Hilda thought desperately. _Please don’t continue. Please don’t give the manager a story. Please don’t make me feel bad about ruining her day too. _

“She started this company up from scratch after leaving her home to pursue her dreams. She didn’t have the best start in life, her father was a cruel man. I’m sure you’ve probably heard about Mr. Varley in the news," Dorothea muttered, face twisting in to something bitter. "But she’s overcome so much. She’s such an admirable woman.”

_Oh god, oh fuck._

“She sounds wonderful,” Marianne said.

“Yes,” Dorothea said wistfully. “She’s gone through a lot, but she’s not at all comfortable in dealing with customers, so I tend to take over for her in that regard. Besides, even if I did have reason to be unhappy here, which I don’t, I’d never want to burden her with such a complaint after everything she’s done for me, too.”

_Shit._

Hilda hoped her smile didn’t seem _too_ forced. She had to give herself credit, she really was going through an intense battle of inner turmoil; to smile at all was a feat in itself. Luckily, Caspar chose that moment to throw the door open and stumble back in to Dorothea’s office. Somehow, his hair looked even more messed up than it had done before, and his face was red, as though he’d run all the way back from the second floor. Then Ignatz’s voice came back to her ears.

“_Mission success,” _he said, and Hilda could practically hear the elation in his voice. _“You’re free to leave at any time.”_

“Ah, there you are, Kyle. Thought you’d gotten lost down the toilet,” Hilda clicked her tongue and then turned to Dorothea. “Kids these days and their phones, can’t leave them alone for a moment.”

Dorothea’s smile remained kind and unfazed, and she turned it on to Caspar. “Well, I hope you have a wonderful birthday, Kyle. Your invitations will be done in a couple of hours.” She leaned in close and dropped her voice to a whisper. “I’m sure since it’s your birthday coming up, your mothers will be all too happy to treat you to something nice in a café nearby,” she said with a wink. “There’s one called Gaius’ House that sells the most fantastic sweets, it’s my favourite.”

“Thanks, lady,” Caspar said, still catching his breath. He shuffled away from Dorothea with an awkward smile, and over to stand behind Marianne’s chair to tug on the flowery fabric of her sleeve. “I’m starving, can we go now?”

“So rude,” Hilda tutted again. She stood, fixing Caspar with a reprimanding glare, while internally singing his praises. Teenage boys really could get away with anything, it seemed. “Well, we won’t take up any more of your time, Miss Dorothea. Thank you for all of your wonderful help. I’ll be sure to leave a _fantastic_ review online.”

“Not a problem,” she said, standing to show them out. “It was my pleasure. I’ll let you know when they’re ready to pick up, and I’ll leave them with Flora on the front desk.”

After a few more awkward goodbyes, Hilda took Marianne and Caspar’s hands and led them back through the reception, encouraging them all to stay silent until they got back in to the car. Jeritza was waiting for them a few streets away, and the moment Hilda sank back in to the comforting softness of the seats, she threw her head back and let out a loud groan.

“What the fuck are we supposed to do now? I can’t go beast mode on a manager with social anxiety, that’s fucking _evil._”

_“I mean, you could, but you’d probably earn yourself a special seat in hell for it,” _Ignatz said. And _oh god_ he was right. Hilda had done a lot in her time as the master of undercover reconnaissance, from manipulating rich businessmen in to surrendering their safe passwords, to masterfully flirting information out of just about anyone, but accosting a hardworking businesswoman with a heart of gold and a more than likely tragically upsetting and traumatic backstory – Hilda just couldn’t go through with it without feeling _awful_.

“Hey! Nobody’s even asking me about how amazing I did! I’ve probably gotten enough information to make up for the loss ten times over, what with that special _thing_ I found,” Caspar said, crossing his arms over his chest with a huff. “But none of you will know because you won’t ask me. But one day, _one day_, you’ll all see. You’ll come grovelling and begging and you’ll all say—”

“OK, go on then, _Kyle._ Humour me. What exactly took you so fucking long when all you had to do was find the security room?”

Caspar cracked his knuckles and turned around in the front seat. Jeritza made a small sound of disgust when Caspar’s shoes settled upon the pristine leather, but if Caspar noticed, he didn’t care. “I’m glad you asked, _mother,” _he grinned and pulled out his phone. “The security guard was real lazy - kept falling asleep at the monitors. So I waited in the bathroom for a little while and then wandered up another floor. Kept expecting the guy to get up and chase me back down to the lobby, but he didn’t. I thought it was weird for a while - I mean, he should have noticed me just chilling in the corridor, right? But it turns out, there aren’t any security cameras on the third floor.”

“_There _was_ one,” _Ignatz corrected. _“But it had been switched off.”_

“Yeah,” Caspar continued, “that seems real strange, right? So I tried all the doors along that corridor and not a single one would budge. Like, they were all locked up super tight. All except for one.”

He held up a finger, pausing for ten agonising seconds. “Spit it out, Cas,” Hilda snapped when the pause exceeded the level of tastefully dramatic. “What the fuck was in there?”

Caspar laughed in lieu of a response and just held out his phone. “I snapped some pictures because I’m a fucking genius. Feast your eyes upon my expertise.”

Hilda stared at his phone screen. The picture showed a large, empty room, save for a table with a laptop and a pair of headphones strewn across it. For a moment, Hilda couldn’t really work out what was supposed to be so special about it. It looked more like an abandoned office rather than anything of significance. She was about to curse Caspar out until Marianne asked, “The listening room?”

“_Most likely,_” Ignatz said. “_Secluded area of the building, hidden from security cameras. Nobody would find it suspicious for someone to be locked up in there all day long listening.”_

_“_Wait, this is where they snooped on Dimitri’s office, right?” Hilda asked. When Ignatz confirmed her suspicions she grinned wide. “Ha! Nice work Caspar! I always believed in you.”

“Huh, really? You certainly don’t act like it.”

“Of course I do, you goof. Thanks to you, we’re _so_ gonna beat Claude’s team.”

“It’s not a competition, honey,” Marianne smiled. “But yes, we are.”

“_I think we have enough information on the security to forgo the last part of the plan,” _Ignatz said, and Hilda let out a large sigh of relief. That was a huge weight off of her shoulders. Dorothea could live another day without meeting Karen. _“I don’t think there was much more we could have learned about security. The team only seems to consist of the one guy. That should definitely make infiltration easier.”_

“Well, it’s all up to you now, nerd squad,” Hilda yawned. “I’m gonna go take my family to go and get some fucking coffee. We deserve it.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

\--IGNATZ—

“Hey, Linhardt, wake up,” Ignatz said, shaking Linhardt’s comatose form that was spread out upon Hilda’s plush pink bed. It was an impossible task, usually one that only Caspar’s rambunctious voice could accomplish; trying to wake Linhardt was like trying to wake the dead. Actually, Ignatz would wager that waking the dead would probably be an easier task.

Linhardt groaned and turned away, pulling a pillow over his face. It was fine. Ignatz didn’t have to worry yet. They weren’t due to infiltrate the Varley building for another few hours. He had time. That didn’t mean he wasn’t nervous though. Usually, infiltrations were Lorenz’s area of expertise, with Ignatz acting as a backup for when he needed to be in more than one place at once. It wasn’t often that Claude split the team, but when he did, it always fell to Linhardt and Ignatz to act as infiltrators on Lorenz’s behalf. “_Lorenz’s little protégés,” _he would call them.

Ignatz was good at infiltrating buildings – he could at least get in and out undetected, but it was no secret that he preferred to be behind the computer screen, rather than actually becoming the blinking red dot he was used to following through digital building blueprints. Linhardt was also surprisingly good – his laziness seemed to evaporate in to thin air the moment he was told he had to steal something, even more so if what he was looking to steal intrigued him. Together, they made a good pair. But regardless of how trained they were, Ignatz couldn’t shake the nerves that wracked his body every time he put on his all-black gear and specialised gloves. Watching and doing were two completely different beasts after all, and there were all manners of undetermined variables that could turn the tides against them in an instant, and no amount of planning could change that.

Hilda, Caspar and Marianne had at least made the job a lot easier - Caspar’s discovery being especially beneficial. If the incriminating laptop remained inside the building, Linhardt could focus on downloading the information needed from that, whilst Ignatz focussed on the security room, and the spoils they’d acquire from the success would definitely put them a few steps ahead of the Flame Emperor. Ignatz was sure they’d be able to do a lot more than just find the location of the locket.

Deeming waking Linhardt impossible, Ignatz settled back down to observe the Varley building blueprints; his laptop open at his side showing an outside view of the building. Looking at the age and structure of the brick, scaling the walls without being spotted by CCTV would be easy enough, because while Linhardt was confident he could erase any evidence of their infiltration just like Lysithea, Ignatz preferred not to incur any unnecessary risks. They’d be entering through the windows, grabbing what they needed, and then leaving, hopefully without encountering any guards, and without alerting anyone to their presence.

It was a lot of responsibility – Ignatz’s stomach kept churning at the mere thought of the night that lay ahead – but he was determined to do it well for Claude’s sake. Those new recruits, or rather, _Felix_, had doubted their credibility, and Ignatz could see in the way that Claude kept glancing at them that he was desperate to make Felix eat his own words. Ignatz certainly wouldn’t be the one to let him down, no matter how nervous he was.

“Working hard there Ignatz? I haven’t seen you eat anything yet,” Raphael said. Ignatz near jumped out of his skin – he’d been so absorbed in memorising the plans, that he hadn’t noticed Raphael’s return from the hotel gym. When his gaze turned on to Raphael though, he wished he’d developed Linhardt’s talent for remaining oblivious despite interruption. Covered in sweat and wearing a shirt that looked _way_ too tight to be comfortable, Raphael brought a burning blush to Ignatz’s cheeks.

“U-uh, yeah!” he managed to stutter, pointedly turning away to end his blatant staring.

“Thought so.” Ignatz could hear the smile in Raphael’s voice, and then the rustling of a bag. “I knew you’d forget to eat again, so I brought you some lunch! You can’t skip meals, Ig. You’re gonna need the energy, especially tonight!”

Raphael handed him a sandwich, his body hovering over Ignatz’s to place it somewhere that wasn’t occupied by copious amounts of paper and wire, and then sat down next to him. The mattress dipped under his weight and Ignatz swallowed down the nerves that were rapidly growing for an entirely different reason.

Ignatz took the sandwich, unwrapping it to find that it was his favourite kind of filling too; crispy fish and salad. Raphael always knew exactly what to get. “Thanks, Raph,” he said with a small smile.

“You look nervous,” Raphael noted, eyebrows furrowing.

Ignatz did_ not_ want to confess that the reason he felt as though his heart might jump out of his chest, was largely due to the fact that Raphael was still sitting unbearably close in his skin-tight workout gear, and so he settled instead for revealing his insecurities about the heist. To Raphael’s credit, he was a great listener, and a great source of reassurance, so Ignatz wasn’t too worried about sounding stupid or over-dramatic. “I guess I am a little,” he said. “There are so many things that could go wrong. But I suppose I’m just used to overthinking things by now.”

“Hey, you’ll be fine!” Raphael grinned, his loud voice curiously soothing in the way that it forcibly stopped Ignatz from thinking just to process it. “I’ve seen you sneak in to places before, you’re great at it! Also, don’t think I haven’t noticed how much you’ve been going to the gym lately either! You’ve bulked up quite a bit.”

Again, Ignatz had to conveniently abstain from confessing that his gym trips were more so a reason to hang out with and see Raphael than anything else; his additional strength was nothing more than a convenient side-effect of his glaringly obvious crush. “I guess it’s a good thing I have been. Climbing buildings is hard, and I haven’t done it in quite a while.” Ignatz readjusted his glasses, sighing in to his hand.

“Seriously, Ignatz. Don’t worry about it! Linhardt doesn’t look worried, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen him even lift a dumbbell.”

That much was true, but Ignatz was positive that Linhardt’s strength was simply a resulting by-product of his combined inquisitiveness and spite. He reminded Ignatz of a cat in that regard, and in the way he slept for near thirteen hours after even the most menial of tasks.

“I guess I’m always just a little more cautious when Lorenz isn’t around. He always knows exactly what to do, and I’m not so sure I’d be able to lead the team like he could if something went wrong. It’s so much easier talking in to the mic.”

Raphael’s frown deepened and he grabbed Ignatz by the shoulders. “Hey now,” he said, forcibly turning Ignatz to face him, “no self-deprecation on my watch. You’re more than capable of leading us! You’ve basically led us all through this right alongside Hilda anyway.”

“Huh, I hadn’t really thought of it that way,” Ignatz frowned. If he was truthful, he’d probably done even more so than Hilda in regards to leading, because it wasn’t as though she really enjoyed leading all that much, rather she just took to giving orders and delegating better than anyone else. Still, Raphael’s reassurance settled Ignatz some – his positive attitude infectious enough to melt away a large portion of his insecurities. Or maybe that was just Ignatz’s skin burning under Raphael’s tight grip.

“See, you’re way stronger than you think. And if I need to burst in and tear the building brick from brick to save you from security guards, you know I’m always waiting nearby.” Raphael removed his hands from Ignatz, and punctuated the sentiment with an impressive flex of his muscles. Ignatz felt his motivation skyrocket after only a tentative glance.

“Hopefully it won’t come to that,” Ignatz laughed and then moved the blueprints away. He needed to relax for a while. There was such a thing as over-preparation, after all; Claude taught him as much after his first ever burn out. “But that makes me feel a whole lot better.”

Raphael wrapped him in a suffocating hug, strong, muscled limbs almost squeezing the breath from his lungs. The last thing Ignatz was going to do however, was try to wriggle out of it. Raphael’s casual affection was always welcome. “I believe in you, Ignatz. We all do!”

Ignatz squeezed Raphael back. “Thanks, Raph.”

A small beeping sound from his laptop ruined the moment and told him that Hilda and the gang were trying to get back in contact. A while had passed since she’d turned off the communication to go shopping, but now, Ignatz supposed, it must be time to wrap up the investigation and for them to return to the hotel.

It was with extreme reluctance that he let go of Raphael and hooked himself back up to the communication line. As he worked, he could feel Raphael’s heavy stare watching his hands whizz over the laptop keys. The buzz in Ignatz’s chest and the burning beneath his cheeks only intensified under the scrutiny, and _goddess_, he was supposed to be relaxing.

“_We’re going to pick up the cards,” _Caspar’s voice came in, as loud and brash as always. It made Ignatz wish he didn’t have to wear the headphones to hear them. It felt like Caspar’s voice was piercing his brain.

“_We should be back in an hour or two. I’ll pick up food on the way back or whatever if anyone’s hungry,”_ Hilda said.

Ignatz turned to Raphael. “You hungry?”

“Always,” Raphael grinned.

“Yeah, we’ll eat,” Ignatz said to Hilda. “Linhardt will probably be awake by the time you get back too.”

_“Geez, OK, that’s a lot of people to remember. Sorry I even offered in the first place.”_

“I can text you orders if that would be easier.”

_“Nah, you’ll just have what you’re given. I don’t really care.”_

Almost simultaneously, Ignatz got a text from Marianne asking him to text _her_ the orders instead, and despite having just eaten, both Ignatz and Raphael spent the next fifteen minutes pouring over an Adrestian takeaway restaurant menu.

“It’s all so fancy,” Raphael said after several breaks to search up the dish names just to work out what any of it actually meant. “Where are all the hearty meat dishes?”

Ignatz wondered the same thing - he had no idea what Bourgeois Pike was, but it sounded way too expensive to even consider. Eventually, they settled on some of the only ordinary sounding dishes available; a vegetable and meat pie, and several servings of meat skewers. Then, Ignatz’s phone rang again, and this time, it was Lysithea calling.

A small jolt of fear ran through him at the thought of Claude’s plan backfiring somehow. Was something wrong? Had they been discovered? A thousand and one possibilities assaulted him from the time he picked up the phone, to the time he rested it against his ear. Even Raphael’s smile faltered for a moment.

“Hey, just checking in,” Lysithea’s bored voice came through and Ignatz let out a large sigh of relief. “What? Did you think I was calling because something was wrong?” Lysithea scoffed.

“What? No,” Ignatz backtracked. “I was just… uh… tired? Doesn’t matter. How is it going?”

Lysithea paused. “It’s definitely going.” Ignatz could feel the weight of her eye roll from three rooms away. “Though listening to those idiots is seriously giving me a headache. I had to make Lorenz take over listening so I could have a goddamn break. Doesn’t help that the man they’re talking to is just as insufferable as them either.”

“Sucks to be you,” Ignatz smiled. “We’ve had a grand time. Hilda’s even picking us up food on the way back.”

“What the fuck? You’re done already?”

“Yep. Only could have been quicker and easier if Dorothea had handed us the locket there and then.”

“Ugh. Why do I always get stuck with the bullshit? Sure you don’t want to swap?”

Ignatz thought about it for a few seconds – it certainly would be a good way to get out of the infiltration later that evening. But then Lysithea hated going outside at night, especially in to hauntingly empty and quiet buildings - he wouldn’t put her through that even if he could. “That’s quite alright, Lys. I’d rather save my innocence than listen to whatever’s going on over there.”

“You. Have. No. Idea. Sylvain’s really going to town with this character, and Claude is only encouraging him. If I were Ferdinand, I’d have decked them both in the face by now.”

“Oh, if you manage to catch that on camera, please send it on over. We have some time to kill.”

“Show off,” Lysithea muttered. “Honestly, I have half a mind to drive down there and punch them myself. Still, we’ve gotten some vital information. It’ll be super useful if they manage to get out of there in one piece.”

“We’ll see if it’s better information than _our_ information,” Ignatz grinned, thinking of Caspar’s invaluable find. Splitting up always resulted in an unspoken competition. And, with the stakes of this mission being so much higher under the pressure of Sylvain and Felix’s expectations, everyone was eager to be the one to take Felix down a peg. Even Raphael who didn’t even care about such opinions had been excited to watch Caspar’s on-screen endeavours. 

“What did you find?”

“That’s a secret until debriefing.”

“Ignatz. Don’t make me—”

Ignatz hung up with a snicker and waited precisely three seconds for his phone to blow up with messages.

“Everything good?” Raphael asked.

Ignatz looked at his most recent message: _‘fuck you nat answer me!! i know your room number!!!’_

“Everything’s fine.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

\--LINHARDT—

Linhardt wasn’t so much as coaxed back in to consciousness as he was dragged. Caspar’s voice always did have a knack for piercing right through to his subconscious mind. There was probably something interesting and scientific behind that idea, but Linhardt wasn’t ready to analyse the effects of love on the human body _just_ yet. He had a more pressing project to attend to – the invitation Caspar had just thrust in to his face.

“Who else wants an invitation to my birthday party? We’re gonna be playing Musical Statues: Fortnite Edition and eating hot dogs,” he announced to the room. Only Raphael raised his hand.

Linhardt yawned and took the whole stack before reaching up and pushing Caspar’s messy hair out of his eyes. “I thought I was the only one invited.”

Caspar’s eyes widened as though Linhardt had just told him he’d left the stove on at home. Which had happened before - neither of them were very good at remembering small details like locking the apartment door, or turning the stove off. Claude said it was a miracle that they were both still alive, and Linhardt was inclined to agree. “Oh! Yeah, sorry Raph. Maybe next time.”

“Which one of you motherfuckers wanted the _eight orders_ of meat skewers?” Hilda asked, tearing off her atrocious wig and throwing a large bag of food down on to the pristine glass of the coffee table.

“Oh, that’s two orders for Linhardt and the rest is for Raph,” Ignatz said. And while Linhardt hadn’t, in fact, ordered anything, he wasn’t about to pass up on the offer. His growling stomach would never forgive him.

They ate while Caspar retold the day’s events in startling detail, and Linhardt was glad to note that it hadn’t devolved in to the disaster Caspar had prophesised. If anything, he was delighted to discover that his night time infiltration plan had deviated slightly to include this new listening room. Once they got the security footage, they’d also be able to piece together the puzzle of _who_ exactly had been frequenting such a room, something which would inevitably keep Linhardt busy digging in to for a long time. It definitely was a wise decision to have gotten in some hours of sleep before he inevitably spent the next seventy-two hours in front of his laptop screen chasing down the Flame Emperor and their associates. 

At some point later in to the evening, Hilda and Marianne left in search of a spa, and Raphael went down to check on the cars with Byleth, while Linhardt and Ignatz got changed and started to make their final preparations for the night ahead. The infiltration uniform of skin-tight, soft black nylon was not only to keep them well hidden in the shadows, but also to reduce friction when sliding through vents or shuffling across floors. It wasn’t Linhardt’s favourite thing to wear – he much preferred clothing designed for comfort rather than practical use – but his argument with Lorenz in favour of wearing his onesie inside building vents had not gone well to say the least. Still, Caspar seemed to enjoy seeing him in his uniform for one reason or another.

The slamming of doors and rattle of loud voices echoing down the corridor told everyone that Claude and his team had finally returned from their reconnaissance mission. It had taken a lot longer than expected, so much so that Linhardt was afraid to ask for the reasoning behind their lateness. He did manage to catch Sylvain shout something along the lines of “Leonie got arrested,” however, and drew a conclusion of his own that probably wasn’t far from the truth.

“I’m sure the entire hotel knows we’re under cover by now,” Ignatz groaned.

“Nah, people are too oblivious to come to_ that_ conclusion,” Caspar waved him off and settled himself behind Linhardt on the bed to begin the lengthy task of tying his hair back. Honestly, Raphael was the better choice – his hair dressing skills were second to none having basically raised his little sister - but whenever Caspar insisted, Linhardt couldn’t refuse him. There was something comforting about having a little piece of Caspar with him whenever he went out on infiltration missions, even if the braid was messy and collapsed after an hour or so.

“They probably think we’re just a bunch of drunk youths,” Linhardt sighed, leaning back in to Caspar’s touch as he combed his fingers gently through his hair. It would be so easy to simply fall back asleep and pretend as though it weren’t his job to go trespassing in a couple of hours.

“Drunk youths in a five-star hotel at seven o’clock on a Monday evening? Are you sure?”

“Oh, absolutely,” Caspar nodded behind him, and started weaving Linhardt’s hair in to something of a pattern. Linhardt didn’t have to be facing him to know that Caspar’s tongue was sticking out cutely in immense concentration. “Rich kids are the worst.”

“Ah, of course. I forgot you both went to a rich kids’ college,” Ignatz scoffed, but when he went to follow it up with a quip, his phone made a shrill notification sound that made Linhardt wince. “Oh,” he said, looking down at the screen, “Claude’s moving our briefing session to tomorrow morning instead, since his team got back later than planned.”

“Probably for the best,” Linhardt said, stretching his legs out to get more comfortable in Caspar’s lap. “I don’t suppose Hilda would have enjoyed having her spa night with Marianne interrupted.”

“She’s been talking about it non-stop all day,” Caspar groaned. “What even is an aromatherapy massage?”

“No idea,” Ignatz said. “I’m more interested in what happened in the Aegir building.”

“Can’t you just ask Lysithea? She loves talking shit about everyone.”

Ignatz’s face twisted. “Uh, no can do. I kinda told Lys we weren’t going to tell her what discovery _we_ made until briefing and then hung up on her.”

Linhardt snorted and Caspar laughed, dropping his section of hair. “Oh shit,” he mumbled under his breath, unravelling everything he’d spent the last ten minutes doing. He tied it back in to a simple, loose ponytail and then patted Linhardt’s shoulder in an ‘I’m done’ kind of way. “How many angry messages do you have as of right now?”

“As of right now…. Two-hundred-and-twelve.”

“Yikes.”

“Yeah. That’s a no-go, and she’s probably got everyone else under strict instruction not to tell us either. Not that Lorenz would really care, but Lysithea’s scary when she’s mad.”

“If it’s any consolation, I overheard something of Leonie getting arrested. Again. It’s probably not as spectacular as you’re imagining,” Linhardt said.

“Again?” Ignatz groaned. “Ugh, that’s another month’s budget blown on Leonie’s bail.”

Caspar shuffled back around to Linhardt’s side and crossed his legs. “You know, I really do wonder why everyone calls _me_ the fuck up when Leonie gets arrested at least _once_ every job.”

Linhardt automatically turned and dropped his head in to Caspar’s lap – the perfect pillow. “It’s because Claude likes you too much to send you to jail, Caspar.” Linhardt left out the point where he’d probably resort to threatening Claude with some kind of cybercrime if he even _thought_ about putting Caspar in jail for a job.

Caspar’s eyes lit up. “Really?”

“Yeah,” Linhardt said around a yawn. His body immediately felt heavy; it really was impossible to stay awake after committing to lying down. “Plus, Leonie broke the table. Repentance and all that.”

“Hey, Linhardt,” Ignatz said, a warning somewhere behind his words, “don’t fall asleep. We have to leave in like an hour.”

“That’s ‘_like an hour’_ of nap time,” Linhardt yawned again and closed his eyes. He had napping down to an art form. ‘Like an hour’ was more than enough time to stock up on some last-minute energy; he’d had forty-five second power naps that had left him feeling _slightly_ more invigorated. Any time was good time, and if Linhardt had been brewing himself an unhealthy dose of coffee, he couldn’t imagine anyone complaining about it. If anything, his method of supplying himself with energy was _way_ more sustainable.

Ignatz said something. Linhardt didn’t hear it, sleep already claiming him.

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

The second time Linhardt awoke that evening, was to Caspar lightly shaking him awake.

“Wake up Lin, it’s almost time to go.”

Linhardt groaned and sat up, keeping his eyes stubbornly closed against the light of the chandelier above head. During his nap, Marianne and Hilda had returned from the spa, and with them came what felt like a tangible cloud of floral perfume. It made his nose wrinkle under its intensity.

“Get up Sleeping Beauty, it’s time to get wired up,” Hilda said impatiently. When Linhardt made no effort whatsoever to move, she clicked her tongue. “Leeches, the lot of you. Honestly. Sleeping in _my_ bed. It’s gonna smell like you turds forever.”

Caspar made an affronted noise, “I don’t sm—”

“Yes you fucking do,” Hilda said almost immediately. “How am I supposed to make out with my super-hot fiancée in our super-cute room, when the bed smells of dude and teenage boy body spray?”

“You could always switch rooms with us,” Linhardt said with a sly smile.

“Nice try, ball sack,” Hilda sneered. “Like I’d give up this suite.”

“Wires are ready,” Ignatz interrupted their squabble with nervous impatience to shove wires in to Linhardt’s hands – an earpiece and a tiny microphone to communicate with those waiting in the car outside and those back at the hotel should something go wrong. Linhardt threaded it under his clothes, attaching the strips of Velcro on the wire to the sections of Velcro sewn inside of his shirt.

Once he was wired up, Linhardt woke his laptops – one for Jeritza to observe in the car, and two for Marianne, Hilda and Caspar to monitor back at the hotel. He pulled up the communication programmes to synch up his and Ignatz’s wires, and then set up the rest of the team, handing out headsets.

“Remember what I said,” Hilda held up a finger as she put on her headset and tested the microphone, “taser the bastards.”

Ignatz made a face but humoured Hilda nonetheless with a thumbs up. They weren’t taking tasers with them, but Linhardt couldn’t deny that he would have enjoyed trying one out for the first time – so long as there wasn’t any blood involved. For all the complaining he’d done about being bossed around by Hilda, Linhardt could probably do more under her lax leadership than he’d ever done under Claude’s. Because, luckily for everyone, Claude had a way stronger moral compass than Hilda, and actually cared whether or not the experiments Linhardt was conducting had life-threatening consequences.

Like clockwork, the team prepared to leave in a bustle of hushed noise. Ignatz rolled up the blueprints, while Linhardt made some final adjustments to his app, plotting the best point of entry for them both. Raphael packed up the grapples, wires, and climbing harnesses, and Caspar stood by impatiently, hopping from foot to foot.

When everybody was entirely consumed by their own tasks, busy getting excited for an eventful night, Caspar pulled Linhardt aside. “Be careful, Lin,” he said when it was time to go, voice uncharacteristically soft and unsure. “Don’t fall out of the window or anything.”

“I’m not going to fall out of the window, Caspar. I’ve done this before.”

While that was true, Linhardt _had_ almost fallen out of the window that time. If not for Lorenz, he might have been living with multiple broken bones for the first few months of his time with Team Claude.

“Well yeah, but that was before I _knew._”

Linhardt frowned. “Knew what?”

Caspar looked as though he’d just seen a ghost, but cleared his throat and grabbed Linhardt’s hand. It was warm and slightly sweaty. “Before I knew I was in love with you,” he said, face turning red, eyes catching everything but Linhardt’s. “So you can’t die or get arrested or anything else bad, OK?”

Linhardt smiled, warmth spreading from his chest to the tips of his fingers. They’d been dancing around ‘I love yous’ for the better part of three months, both too scared to say it lest it be too soon, or sound too intense and scare the other away. Of course Caspar would be the first to get it out; he always was the brave one.

Linhardt rubbed his thumb over Caspar’s hand still locked around his own. “I’m in love with you too, Cas,” he breathed, and Caspar unknowingly squeezed his hand a little too tightly in shock. “So you don’t have to worry. Besides, I’d miss you too much if I got arrested.”

Caspar grinned and placed a wet kiss on Linhardt’s cheek. Usually, Linhardt would groan and wipe it off, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it, not when he was feeling so utterly enamoured. “You wouldn’t have to miss me for long! I’d get myself arrested too so we could spend the rest of our life in prison together.”

“That really doesn’t sound as romantic as you think it does, Cas,” Linhardt grimaced at the thought of their matching uniforms and of theoretical guard yelling at him for falling asleep.

“What? Of course it does! You and me, sharing a cell, nobody telling us what to do. Sounds perfect.”

“You are _horribly_ misinformed on what prison entails, but I appreciate the thought,” Linhardt hummed and wrapped Caspar in a hug, resting his head on his shoulder. “How about we pledge for _neither_ of us to get arrested, and instead to come back to the hotel and fall asleep, safe and sound?”

Caspar returned the hug. “Yeah. That actually sounds way better.”

Linhardt hummed again and then detached himself from Caspar. “You need to get wired up too,” he said, nodding towards Ignatz’s bag of wires. “I’ll need you in my ear.”

“Really? You want _me_ to talk to you through it?”

“Of course. Who else?”

“I don’t know. Nobody usually wants me screaming in their ears,” Caspar shrugged and rubbed the back of his head. Self-conscious, Linhardt noted. Self-conscious Caspar was few and far between, but it was impossible _not_ to spot the signs when the feeling did surface. Linhardt, if possible, liked to stomp it out as quickly as he could manage.

“Nonsense,” Linhardt shook his head. “Your voice keeps me awake. Awake and motivated. I’d fall asleep halfway through climbing up the building without you.”

Caspar’s usual confidence inflated his posture once more and he grinned. “Well in that case, I guess I can’t refuse!”

Linhardt was about to say that he couldn’t refuse anyway, because Caspar had been the one to find the room he was about to infiltrate, but was interrupted again by Hilda. It was time to leave, no doubt.

“Alright nerds, time to go. Jeritza is waiting outside. Start-up communications once you get in the car and let us know when you’re about to enter the building. I want this done quickly, get in, get out and get back safely. Got it? Claude will have my head if any of you mess up, so show some compassion for your old pal Hilda, OK?”

“Yes ma’am,” Raphael beamed, shouldering three bags and then saluting with his free hand.

Caspar gave Linhardt one final parting hug with a chaste kiss for good luck, and then skipped off to get himself a headset.

Jeritza was waiting outside, just as Hilda had instructed. He looked as bored as usual, face set in to stony indifference. Linhardt wasn’t very adept at reading people who weren’t Caspar, but Jeritza was harder to read than anyone else; it was impossible to tell what that man was thinking. Whether he was elated, or filled with murderous intent, was a mystery that would likely remain unsolved.

The night had fallen heavily in their time locked up inside the hotel room. Midnight street lights and car headlights flickered by the windows as Jeritza drove them back to Varley like jewels, blinking and blinding. Linhardt pulled out his phone again, checking the infiltration route one last time. The both of them were to climb the back of the building out of view of the outside security cameras, make their way to their respective rooms – Ignatz’s security room on the second floor, and Linhardt’s listening room on the third – plug in their memory sticks, and download all of the necessary data. It sounded easy. It probably would be easy, but where there was an Ignatz, there was doubt, voiced clear as day for everyone to ruminate in.

“If for some reason there are guards - which I’m almost positive there shouldn’t be - but if there _are—”_

_“I told you to taser them,” _Hilda’s voice came through, bored and most definitely punctuated with a roll of her eyes.

“If there _are_,” Ignatz continued, ignoring her, “we signal on communication and get out as fast as we can through the windows. Jeritza will be waiting right outside. They won’t be expecting us, so they won’t be able to mobilise fast enough to give chase.”

“_I already told you, the guard on duty was sleeping on the job,” _Caspar reminded everyone. “_I don’t think he’d be able to catch you if you walked all the way back here.”_

“Also, this is a small business. It’s almost guaranteed that everyone’s gone home for the night. No need for a night guard in a sleeping building," Linhardt said.

“I’d rather be safe than sorry.” Ignatz crossed his arms over his chest.

“Good idea, Ignatz,” Raphael said from the front seat. “But you forgot the last part of the plan! Any guards chasing you from the building will have to go through me first!”

“_Raph the Tank!” _Hilda jeered.

“_Aw yeah! I want to see Raph the Tank in action again!”_ Caspar shouted.

“_While I agree that Raph the Tank is certainly a spectacle to behold, I don’t think we should be rooting for confrontation,”_ Marianne said.

“_Yeah guys for fuck sake, grow up,_” Hilda scoffed.

“_You were the one who brought it up!”_ Caspar yelled back, and then the line went quiet as Caspar and Hilda took of their headsets to quarrel.

Linhardt closed his eyes to the sound of Caspar’s voice in the distance, and didn’t realise he’d fallen asleep again until Ignatz was shaking him awake and saying, “We’re here,” to both him, and the people back at the hotel.

The Varley building was every bit as fascinating up close as it had been to view online. Well, the back of it was, at least. They’d parked a little bit away to stay out of sight of the cameras, but still, from what Linhardt could see, the antiquity of the building was spectacularly preserved – something that was hard to come by in recent times with the modernised and built up cities he was used to living in. Adrestia had once been his home, before he’d left to pursue his interests with Caspar, and it had been a while since he’d seen the familiar buildings of pale, white brick and carved, artistic architecture. It was pleasantly nostalgic.

Once they stepped out of the car and in to the night air however, a shiver wracked Linhardt’s severely underdressed body that made him look up at the building to figure out the fastest way of getting it all done. The sooner he got back to the hotel, to the warmth and comfort of his bed, the better.

After unloading the bags of equipment, Linhardt, Raphael and Ignatz made their way around the building, keeping their lights off to keep themselves hidden in the shadows. The whole building looked vacant – not a single light shone from behind the windows, and not a single car was parked outside. It looked every bit as empty as they had all hoped. Even the streets were quiet and devoid of night life. It was eerie, if anything. Linhardt wasn’t particularly fond of night time excursions, but curiosity always won out over his underlying fear of the paranormal. It would most likely get him killed one day, but that was for Linhardt of the future to concern himself with.

They stepped over low fences, weaved between the sparse foliage surrounding the building, and climbed over various flower beds that almost sent Linhardt tripping blindly over his own feet, but eventually, Ignatz held out a hand and stopped Linhardt and Raphael from walking any further. “This is the side of the two rooms,” he whispered, angling his chin upwards to point at the windows.

Linhardt and Raphael nodded silently, Raphael moving quickly to put the bags down and begin the task of removing their equipment as soundlessly as possible.

Linhardt retrieved his phone again, turning the brightness down as much as he could manage to double check the positions of the security cameras. One at the front of the building overlooking the street and front entrance. No other readings. Perfect.

“Lin,” Raphael said, voice a touch too loud for such a covert operation. He didn’t look bothered, though - there wasn’t another living soul out on the streets, and if there were, they’d be able to hear them coming from at least a few feet away. “Harness,” Raphael clarified and handed Linhardt a complicated tangle of nylon ropes and plastic buckles.

“_Cameras are all functional,” _Hilda said, _“Night vision is hilarious. Linhardt looks like a ghost.”_

“Gee, thanks,” Linhardt grumbled, wrestling with his harness. He almost lost his balance trying to get his booted foot in through the narrow leg hole, but managed to steady himself on the wall before disaster struck.

“Ooh! What do I look like?” Raphael asked, standing in front of Linhardt and crouching slightly to get in to the view of the camera attached to his chest.

“_One hell of a handsome hunk_,” Hilda sang.

“Aw yeah!”

“Guys, quiet,” Ignatz whispered frantically, looking as though he’d just lost five years of his life.

“Oops, sorry, Nat.”

“It’s fine, come on, we need to get inside.”

Linhardt clicked the last of his buckles in to place, and turned to the building again. His entry point was the window was the fourth from the right. The building itself looked easily climbable, with large, protruding brick for good footholds, and a low enough roof for Raphael to cling the grapple upon.

He managed to get Ignatz’s grapple caught solidly enough first time, and he pulled hard on the knotted rope several times to test the give. Once satisfied, he handed it off to Ignatz who started climbing immediately, while Raphael got started on Linhardt’s grapple. It took a few tries to get it this time – Linhardt had to duck out of the way when the grapple almost came back down and knocked him unconscious – but Raphael soon began tugging on his rope and then handed it off.

“All done,” he said, looking up to see Ignatz already halfway up the building.

Linhardt watched him for a moment, the creeping sense of unease settling itself in his stomach at the thought of climbing so high. Still, his curiosity was quelling the feeling substantially, as was Caspar’s encouragement in his ear.

“_Good luck, Lin!”_ Caspar said, clapping his hands.

“Thanks,” Linhardt said quietly, attaching the metal clip of his harness to the one attached to an adjustable knot on the climbing rope.

After another testing tug, Linhardt began to ascend, and with each knot of the rope he pulled himself up to meet, he methodically detached and re-attached the metal clip to a new loop to keep him from falling to his death should his gloved hands lose purchase on the rope. Soon, to the encouraging sounds of Caspar in his ear, the first floor passed beneath his feet, and then the second, and then he was sitting mid-air in front of his entry point, fumbling in his pockets for his infiltration tool. As he hovered there in place, he thought for a moment that he probably should have spent some more time limbering up before leaving rather than sleeping, when the muscles in his arms and legs began to protest.

The window latch came undone easily, much to his relief, and he slid the window open and un-clipped himself from the rope before tumbling in to the vacant listening room.

Linhardt fished his phone from his pocket and turned on the light, shining it around the dark room. It was just as it had been left, just as Caspar had found it earlier. Only, the laptop and headphones were no longer sitting atop the table, and all Linhardt was left staring at was an empty room.

“The laptop is gone,” Linhardt whispered in to the mic.

_“What?_” Hilda’s voice came through, outraged and exasperated.

“Whoever it belonged to must have taken it home with them.”

“_Fuck,”_ she whispered. “_Alright, Lin, get out of there. Forget about the listening room. We’ll figure out who was using it when we get the CCTV footage anyway. Ignatz, what’s the security room situation?”_

_“Downloading now,”_ his voice came through, clipped and hushed.

Linhardt couldn’t hide the weighted disappointment of climbing all that way with nothing to show for it. His shoulders sagged and he mumbled a perfunctory “Got it,” in to the mic. But just as he turned to leave, to begin the arduous task of descending the building, the light of his phone flashed upon something under the table. Something glittering, something shiny. Linhardt stopped in his tracks and hurried over to grab it, immediately shoving it deep down in to his pocket.

It wasn’t until he reached the ground and packed away his grappling gear that he allowed himself to look at his treasure. Under the light of his phone, he could just make out the shape of a flower; a small metal brooch of brilliant red, a single black jewel at its centre.

_Interesting,_ he thought.

“_What’s that?”_ Caspar’s voice came through, obviously observing Linhardt’s chest camera.

Linhardt angled the brooch and light closer to his chest for Caspar to look. “Found it in the listening room.”

“_That looks like the_ _brooch Dorothea was wearing!”_ Caspar gasped, “_Hilda, look!”_

There was shuffling, and then an, “_Oh, fuck! That does look like Dorothea’s brooch!” _Hilda groaned and then clicked her tongue. “_Damn, I didn’t want her to be involved. She was so nice.”_

_“We don’t know for certain that it _is_ Dorothea’s,” _Marianne, the voice of reason, said. “_It could well be a company standard uniform.”_

_“Damn, I hope so. Nice find, Linhardt.”_

“_All done!”_ Ignatz breathed through the line. “_Get ready to leave as soon as I touch ground.”_

Linhardt hummed and ran his gloved thumb over the smooth metal flower. He supposed they would find out who it belonged to soon enough.


	7. THE AEGIR BUILDING - PART ONE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> here we go

CHAPTER SEVEN: CLAUDE

THE AEGIR BUILDING – PART ONE

“You look atrocious,” Lorenz grimaced, giving Claude a once-over. “A _blazer_ with _khaki_ shorts?” Claude gave him an extra spin and a pose for good measure and Lorenz wrinkled his nose. “I’m going to be sick.”

“Thanks, Lorenz. I appreciate the honesty,” Claude drawled, letting his peace sign fall dejectedly back to his side. Were Lorenz looking at him with such intensity any other time, he might have blushed and retorted with flirtatious banter, but as it stood, Claude felt every bit as atrocious as Lorenz was claiming. It was impossible to feel anything else in an ill-fitting shirt, novelty tie, khaki shorts, and a pretentiously tight blazer after all.

“I’ve never looked this bad in my life,” Sylvain sighed, picking at his own salmon pink shorts like they were contaminated. At least Hilda had spared Claude from the worst of the wardrobe. Sylvain was significantly worse off - not only had been forced to comply with a bottle of temporary hair dye, he was also wearing a bowtie.

“What are you talking about? You used to look like that all the time growing up,” Felix scoffed, looking up from the blueprints for a moment to narrow his eyes at Sylvain.

Sylvain narrowed his eyes right back. “You do _not_ get to criticise seventeen-year-old Sylvain’s choices when you and your little LARP buddies almost _died_ trying to wear _real_ knight armour on the hottest day of the year.”

“Oh my _god_,” Leonie whispered, a twinkle in her eye as she watched Felix’s face redden.

“Fuck you. Ashe was the one who said it was going to be cold that day.”

“Yeah, but Ashe was also the one that took his armour _off_ when he started to feel like he was going to pass out. Do you know how hard it was to carry you and Ingrid to the nurse’s office in four million tonnes of metal armour?”

Claude couldn’t stop the smile from overtaking his face when he imagined a younger Felix waddling around a school campus in armour ten times too big for him. It certainly altered Claude’s first impressions of Felix in an 'imagine them naked' kind of way - he was nowhere near as intimidating as before.

“Whatever,” Felix snapped. “You still look like a fucking idiot now.”

“Of course,” Sylvain bowed with a flourish of his hand. “Sir Felix.”

Felix looked for something to throw, but Lysithea’s scowl warned him that everything in reach was way too valuable to weaponize. He settled for another glare, and Claude huffed out a laugh. “Never would have pegged Felix for being a nerd growing up,” he grinned. “You strike me more as the emo type.”

“What, you didn’t gather that from his _sword_ obsession?” Sylvain lifted an eyebrow and then shook his head sadly. “He’s the most dangerous nerd I know. Oh, and Ingrid.”

“Call me a nerd again,” Felix growled. “See what happens.”

“Who’s Ingrid?” Leonie ignored Felix to ask. “Is she in to girls? Is she hot? Is she _single?”_

“Yes to all three,” Sylvain winked. "She's also desperate and hopelessly in to girls with big muscles."

Leonie went to open her mouth again when Linhardt walked in to Claude’s hotel room and silenced everyone. He didn’t look fazed in the slightest, just sauntered over and perched himself on the corner of the vacant armchair as though nothing had happened.

“How did you even get in?” Sylvain asked, dumbfounded. The door had been closed and locked behind them, but Claude knew better than to question Linhardt’s methods. Had he not joined Claude, he probably could have excelled in magic and illusion with how excellent his sleight-of-hand had become over the years.

“Stole Lorenz’s card key,” Linhardt shrugged, flicking the key back over to an affronted-looking Lorenz. “Hilda’s team just left,” he added before anyone could interrupt him with questions. Then, when he actually stopped to take in Claude and Sylvain’s attire, his face twisted in to disgust, and he took out his phone to snap several pictures. “Goddess, you look like a college nightmare.”

Claude crossed his arms over his chest and stuck out his chin. “Did you come by just to make fun of us? Laughing at Hilda’s wig wasn’t enough for you?”

“No, I have reasoning. Although this certainly was a… bonus,” he said, glancing at Sylvain again. “I actually came to give you something before you go.”

“A gift?” Claude put a hand to his chest and gasped. “For me?”

“Yes,” Linhardt deadpanned. “Give me your phone.”

“Woah now,” Claude’s smile dropped and he laughed weakly, hand tightening around his phone in his pocket. Handing one’s phone over to Linhardt was not something to be taken lightly. Not if you wanted it back alive and well. “You’re not going to do anything weird to it are you? I kinda need it for this mission, and I saw what you did to Leonie’s.”

“Yeah, about that,” Leonie interjected. “How exactly do I make it stop screaming at random intervals during the night?”

“I don’t know,” Linhardt fixed her with a bored stare. “Maybe you should have thought about that before you glued my ass to my desk chair with epoxy adhesive.”

“Fair enough,” she nodded.

“Phone,” Linhardt prompted, hand outstretched and grabbing impatiently. When Claude hesitated still, Linhardt sighed. “Do you want the app or not?”

“_Oh!”_ Claude blanched, and scrambled to throw his phone Linhardt’s way. “Of course! I forgot about that. What is it? What does it do?”

Linhardt held up a finger and plugged something ominous and square in to the bottom of Claude’s phone, tapping the screen in silence as everybody observed him with bated breath. He waited for a few moments, unplugged his weird device, and then handed Claude’s phone back.

Waiting for Claude on the screen was an open app – a map, by the looks of it - though he remained cautious. Linhardt was scarily adept at phone pranks, to the point where if left unattended, it was almost a certainty the device would house some kind of irritating defect for the next two weeks. Claude’s malfunctioning auto-correct stuck out particularly prominently in his mind as something he would definitely like to avoid in the future. 

“A map?” Claude asked.

“Type in the address for the Aegir building,” Linhardt said, seating himself back down on the arm of the chair.

Claude did as instructed, typing the details in to the search bar. The moment he pressed enter, the map began to fly across Adrestia, zooming and focussing on the Aegir building they were due to infiltrate in the coming hours. After a few seconds, the map stopped zooming, leaving Claude staring at a blueprint version of the ground floor of the building and several blinking red and green dots.

“Those dots correspond to all known operational security cameras,” Linhardt said with a smug smile at his own phone. He tapped something on the screen and Claude’s app mirrored the command, bringing up a real-time image of one of the security cameras. “Red means they’re footage only, green means they record sound too.”

Claude stopped. “Um. _What_?”

“You can use it to mark any points of interest and it’ll synch over all devices. Oh, and it also updates in real time, so if any cameras get switched off, or turned on, you’ll know about it.”

“_Oh my god,”_ Claude whispered. This was even better than the time they’d first used earpieces on a job. Claude had been so elated to finally feel like a fully-fledged leader of a professional-grade retrieval team that he’d almost cried real, genuine tears upon hearing Ignatz’s quiet ‘_Testing’_ in his ears.

“You can’t be serious,” Felix’s brash voice broke the spell for a moment, appearing beside Claude’s shoulder to get a look at the app for himself. “That’s like eight-hundred types of illegal.”

“Linhardt,” Claude ignored Felix to say, walking over and placing a hand on Linhardt’s shoulder. “Have I ever told you that you’re my favourite?”

Lysithea, who up until now had existed in a corner of the room with her headphones placed snugly over her ears, perked up and frowned. “I thought _I_ was your favourite.”

Claude shook his head. “Sorry, Lys. You’ve been demoted.”

“No, you haven’t told me,” Linhardt said. “But I can think of a few ways you could.”

“Name your price,” Claude said valiantly. “This app is invaluable. The rest of the team would become your personal butlers for the month if you asked.”

“No they wouldn’t,” Lorenz said.

Linhardt made a face, his nose crinkling in disgust. “Thanks, but I think I’ll pass on Leonie throwing cold coffee over my head for the foreseeable future. I have a list that I’ll get to you in the coming days.”

Claude hesitated for a moment, wondering _what_ exactly he was about to agree to – the tech team seemed to really enjoy emptying the bank – but then he glanced back at the app in his hand and immediately said, “Whatever you want is yours, Lin.”

“Perfect,” Linhardt grinned. “Well I’m off to nap. I’ll leave this with Lysithea and she can install it on the rest of your devices,” he said, placing the app device on the nearby table. “Have fun. Do not talk to me. If you encounter any problems with it, I certainly will not wake up to help you.”

“Thank you, Linhardt. Seriously, this is amazing,” Claude said. “You’ve outdone yourself.”

Linhardt waved him off and started for the door. “I know,” he said, and closed the door behind him with a soft click.

There was only a beat of silence before Felix said, “You can’t seriously use that thing.”

“Um, why the fuck not?” Leonie asked.

“Because it’s—”

“—Illegal? Yeah, we really don’t care about that,” Leonie scoffed. “If we did, we certainly wouldn’t be in this profession. Pull the stick out of your ass, knight boy.”

“It’s fine, I have permission to use things like this,” Claude said with nonchalance, locking his phone and putting it back in to his pocket.

“Wow. Really?” Sylvain asked, eyebrow raised as though he were impressed.

“No. Not in the slightest. But it’s fine. Nobody will ever find out because we’ll never get caught.”

“Yeah, the only way the authorities could _theoretically_ find out is if someone snitched,” Leonie said with a pointed glare in Felix’s direction. “And we all know who to murder should that happen.”

Felix looked to Claude as if to wait for his disagreement, but Claude just shrugged.

“You’d best leave all of your hesitation for rule breaking at the hotel if you plan on infiltrating later tonight,” Lorenz said, crossing his arms over his chest with a pompous smile. “Nothing that you’re about to do is entirely lawful.”

“I know that,” Felix snapped. “Just seems like cheating. I don’t like it.”

“_Cheating_?” Lorenz scoffed incredulously. “Oh good lord. Well it’s a good thing we don’t care about whether or not you ‘like’ something, isn’t it? Or we’d never get anything productive done. Pray tell, what exactly do you propose we do instead? Enter blindly and let the gods decide our fate?”

“Fine,” Felix huffed, face growing increasingly more agitated by the second. He pulled out his phone and stomped over to Lysithea with Linhardt’s device. “Give me the stupid app. I’ll use it better than all of you combined.”

Lysithea stared at him, and then to the devices blankly. “I don’t think there is a right and wrong way to use it,” she said with a shrug. “But I guess I’ll have fun watching you try to figure out a way how.”

“OK, well, good luck with that,” Claude said, feeling the vibration of a text message against his leg. He pulled out his phone again to check that his intuition hadn’t failed him. It hadn’t. “It’s time for the undercover team to roll out,” he said, shooting Byleth a quick, ‘on our way’ message in response to their arrival.

“Everyone got their earpieces in?” Lysithea asked before they left.

Claude touched his ear and felt the small piece of plastic still sitting comfortably inside it. “Yep. We’ll do a function test in the car. Does everybody know what they need to do?” To a chorus of ‘yes’ in varying degrees of enthusiasm, Claude grinned. “Well come on then, bro,” he said to Sylvain. “Let’s go get ourselves a book deal.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

Claude looked up at the monstrosity that was the Aegir building and sucked in a breath. He certainly didn’t envy Lorenz and Felix – their infiltration would _not _be easy. It was almost as tall as the Blaidydd skyscraper, made more of window than brick, but where the Blaidydd building merged with the surrounding buildings of similar stature and design, the Aegir building seemed oddly out of place against the antiqued Adrestian setting.

“Thanks friend,” Claude waved Byleth off as they took the car to be parked somewhere more inconspicuous, and turned to Leonie and Sylvain. Used to seeing Leonie in mixtures of sport wear and flannel shirts, Claude almost did a double take when seeing her disguise of an expensive-looking business suit and immaculately styled hair. Hilda really had gone all out. “Remember, Leonie—”

“My only line is ‘_I’m here for a business meeting,’_ Claude, I don’t think it’s even _possible_ for me to mess this up.”

“OK, OK, just making sure you’re comfortable.”

“If you wanted to make sure I was comfortable, you could have gotten me something a little less constricting to wear,” Leonie scoffed, tugging at the high collar of her shirt. Though she looked amazing, Claude didn’t envy her – it was way too warm to be wearing so many layers; at least he had shorts to compensate for the tightness of his own blazer.

“You’ll have to take that up with Hilda. Besides, it could be considerably worse,” he said, unable to keep the amusement out of his voice. “You could be Sylvain.”

Claude heard Felix laugh wickedly over the communication line and Sylvain groaned. “If these shorts go any further up my ass, I’ll be _tasting_ salmon pink.” Felix’s laughter almost immediately ceased with an irritated and disgusted click of the tongue.

Claude held up his hands, “Again, not my department. Hilda just really likes tight clothing.”

“You’re telling me,” Sylvain grimaced and squatted in what Claude assumed to be an attempt at dislodging the shorts.

“OK, Leonie, you go in first, get yourself seated and when fifteen minutes have passed, cough in to your mic. We’ll be listening.”

“Got it, boss.”

They watched her leave and cross the street to the building, and when she had safely walked through the automatic doors, Claude leaned against the metal pole of a lamppost, and turned to Sylvain again. “You ready?”

“Please,” Sylvain scoffed, “I was born for this. When Felix and I were little, we actually used to—”

“_Sylvain, shut your goddamn mouth before I run to Aegir and shut it for you.”_

Sylvain obviously didn’t seem threatened – he put a hand over the mic concealed beneath the collar of his shirt and whispered, “We used to pretend we were spies. I’d be the undercover-distraction agent, and Felix would sneak in and steal food from the kitchen cupboards. We never got caught,” he boasted.

“_I can still hear you through Claude’s mic, you fucking idiot,”_ Felix grumbled.

“_Aw, isn’t that precious,” _Lorenz cooed. “_Baby Felix wanted to be just like us when he grew up. Aren't you a lucky duck?”_

“_I _will_ beat you senseless.”_

“You know, we’ve learned so much adorable Felix lore, that your threats are really starting to lose their edge,” Claude grinned.

“_Ha! Yeah, what are you gonna do? Challenge us to a sword duel at dawn on Gronder Field?_” Lysithea laughed.

“_So what if I did? I’d still beat you senseless.”_

_“You’d beat up a _child?_ Wow, that’s low even for you, Felix.”_

“Yeah, Fe, stop threatening children,” Sylvain added, smile wide and affectionate. Claude made an 'X' with his arms and shook his head desperately as he waited for impact.

_“Call me a fucking child again, Sylvain, and I’ll expose your internet search history to the rest of the team.”_

“But you just called yourself—wait, can she _do_ that?” Sylvain’s hand instinctively flew to the phone in his back pocket.

Claude nodded solemnly. Hilda, two years later, still occasionally called him Pink Panther after learning that he’d very seriously searched for what species of animal the creature was. He was incredibly lucky and eternally grateful to his past self for not having searched for anything _truly_ embarrassing before calling Lysithea a ‘tiny baby’. It was a mistake he would endeavour not to make again.

“_That’s what I thought,” _Lysithea goaded after a telling moment of silence.

“_Huh, you got him to shut up in like, three seconds,”_ Felix said, usual bite absent from his voice. “_Can you teach me how to do that?”_

“_Uh… no? I thought my shit was ‘illegal’ anyway,”_ Lysithea scoffed. There was a short silence, in which Felix probably shrugged, and then Lysithea huffed out a breath. “_Get Linhardt to teach you or something, I don’t work with children.”_

_“That’s a trifle malicious, Lysithea,” _Lorenz teased. Claude didn’t have to be in the same room as him to know he was probably leaning against something, arms crossed, and smile artfully condescending. It brought a smile to Claude’s own face when he said, “_You know Linhardt hates teaching people technology. Not even I would wish that kind of humiliation on our little stray cat.”_

_“’Stray cat’?” _Felix deadpanned.

“_Yes, a stray cat. We only have to look in your direction and you’re already biting. Did you just completely ignore the part where I actually said something kind on your behalf?”_

_“No,”_ came Felix’s petulant response. “_I guess it got lost beneath all of your pompous posturing.”_

_“Ooh, ouch.”_

Sylvain looked to Claude with a dejected sigh, but Claude shook his head. This was tasteful banter; Lorenz was probably enjoying himself, which he often did when arguments remained entertaining, rather than spiralling in to the boring realm of violent threats. That was probably why Claude got on so well with him – they’d achieved the perfect balance of playful teasing that could keep them entertained for hours on end. It hadn’t always been that way, Lorenz had had it out for him since they’d been forced to work together on a particularly challenging case, but then the Acheron case came around and changed a lot of people’s opinions of each other. Claude shuddered at the thought.

He didn’t have to reminisce for long, however, because the sound of Leonie hacking in to her microphone quickly changed the mood and caught everyone’s attention.

“God, she’s really going for it,” Sylvain winced. Which was true, Leonie sounded more like she was choking on something, rather than discreetly trying to capture the attention of the team. She’d probably caught the attention of everybody in the reception area and beyond by now. Claude was really starting to miss Hilda’s subtle undercover expertise.

“Leonie, we’ve got it, you can stop now,” Claude said when her coughing continued passed the level of acceptable.

“_Oh,”_ came her startled voice. It was distant though, as though she were talking to someone else entirely. Claude surmised she had to be, what with all the attention she’d probably just garnered. “_Yes, I’m OK thank you, miss. That’s fine. Just a tickle at the back of the throat, haha. Yes. Thanks again.”_

“So much for the one line, Leo,” Claude sighed.

“_She was really hot_,” Leonie whispered. “_Am I allowed to talk to other people?”_

“Oh my god, OK. We’d better get in there quick. Got the treatment?” Sylvain held up a stack of paper and winked. “Good. Let’s go.”

They jogged across the street, figuring that the sooner they got to becoming the second distraction, the better it would be for everybody involved.

When the automatic doors opened for them, Claude almost stopped at how jarringly different the inside of the building was when compared to the quiet outside. Outside, was sterile and hushed, only the sound of distant cars giving notice to any sign of life. Inside, the building was bustling with the rustling noises of paper, the hushed tones of distant voices, and the clicking of fingers against computer keyboards. The reception area held multiple tall desks with queues of people standing before them, and off to the other side of the expansive area were rows upon rows of sofas and plush chairs, one of which Leonie was perched upon, pretending to be stressed and reading important documents.

Claude immediately nudged Sylvain to join one of the closest queues, and Claude used their time stuck waiting to slowly pan across the building, letting his chest camera get a good look around.

“_Sure hope it’s less busy than this when you guys enter later,”_ Lysithea said.

Lorenz scoffed. “_Please, Lysithea. I’ve triumphed in significantly worse conditions than this.”_

“_Yeah, I guess I was just talking about Felix then.”_

_“I don’t need anyone’s concern,” _Felix snapped.

“_Too bad. Our success rides on you tonight, piss baby.”_

_“Where do you even come up with these names? What the fuck even _is_ that?”_

Leonie coughed again, and Claude knew she was just _dying_ to say something along the lines of ‘_It’s you’_. Before he or Sylvain inevitably ended up laughing at something they shouldn’t, Claude decided to distract them both from the voices in their ears, and turned around to talk to the woman who had just joined the queue behind them. Any information was good information after all – maybe the people of Adrestia knew something suspicious and interesting – Claude had found vital information in stranger places.

“Hey,” he said, decorating his voice with the most condescending and irritating tone he could manage. “You got the next best seller like us?”

The woman looked at him blankly, her stare travelling down to take in their hideous attire and then back up to Sylvain who just waved the faked book treatment around. “You could say that,” she said, shifting her weight on to one hip as she procured what looked like an entire, thousand page manuscript of her own from her bag.

“Gorgeous woman like yourself,” Sylvain said with a smirk, “must have written a tragic romance for the ages with all the hearts you’ve probably broken.”

_“Oh god, here we go,”_ Felix groaned.

The woman’s face twisted in to a pained smile. “Yes, well, you try telling Aegir Publishing that,” she said tersely. “They don’t seem to appreciate my flare for operatic drama. They keep calling me lazy and messy, whatever _that_ means.” Her voice trailed off in to a dissatisfied grumble and then she straightened herself back out. “Regardless, I’m thoroughly convinced that the twelfth time’s a charm.”

“I think the manager would have to be blind not to publish a timeless beauty like you.”

Claude was foolish to have worried about Sylvain – he was quite literally in his element. He could possibly even rival Hilda for how naturally he seemed to slip in to the character. Or maybe Felix was right – this wasn’t too far removed from a person Sylvain had once been. Either way, Claude was certainly impressed and significantly less stressed about the plan going haywire.

The woman chuckled and hid a smile behind her hand. “Oh, aren’t you a charmer? Well, if the words you write are anywhere near as pretty as the ones you speak, I don’t suppose _you’ll _have much trouble regardless.”

“You flatter me, Miss…”

“Manuela,” the woman supplied.

“Manuela,” Sylvain repeated with a disarming smile. “I’m Brett. This is Cody.”

“Pleasure to meet you,” Claude grinned. The queue moved forwards, Claude and Sylvain stepped backwards and kept their focus on Manuela.

“The pleasure, I assure you, is mine,” Manuela said. “So, what genre are you boys in to?”

“Why don’t you have a look,” Sylvain said, offering Manuela the erotic book treatment they’d imagined the night before. It was the most pathetically horny piece of writing Claude had ever produced in his life. But credit where credit was due – Sylvain had been instrumental in its creation.

“_Step back a bit, Claude,”_ Lysithea’s voice said in his ear. “_I want to see Manuela’s face when she reads this shit.”_

The queue moved again, and Claude moved with it until Lysithea shouted “_Perfect_!”

The exact moment that Manuela began to process the words she was reading was unmistakable. Her eyes widened, her breath stopped visibly, and pretty soon after, her mouth began to twist in to what Claude could only describe as repulsion. Lysithea burst in to uncontrollable laughter that Claude had to try really hard to block out – it _was_ supposed to be their serious work after all.

“That certainly is… something,” she said, handing the haphazardly stapled stack of paper back to Claude.

“Right? It was a team effort,” Claude said. “My tongue and Brett’s hands, the both of us coming together in perfect harmony.”

Sylvain held out his hand and Claude completed the high-five.

“_That’s the most nauseating thing you’ve ever said,” _Lorenz sighed in his ear.

Claude grinned. “It was like a strictly-platonic-bro’s jack off session but with our brains, you know?”

_“Never mind.”_

Manuela almost grimaced, but kept her expression schooled. Claude couldn’t help but notice how quickly her interest in the both of them had depleted. It was almost comical. “Sounds… invigorating,” she said, slotting her own manuscript back in to her bag. “Well, good luck to the both of you. As I said before, I’ve been through this process eleven times already, but never have I had to walk in and make my own appointment like this. The humiliation,” she groaned. “Mr. Aegir has never been this ‘busy’ before. But I suppose that probably has something to do with all the running around he’s been doing for the head of the company over in Hresvelg.”

“The head of the company is in Hresvelg?” Claude asked.

“Yes,” Manuela sighed. “Edelgard Hresvelg?” When Claude and Sylvain just looked blankly back at her, she continued, “Edelgard is the owner of a conglomerate of different businesses across Adrestia, Aegir Publishing being one of her biggest successes. She makes it a point to endorse and fund struggling businesses with huge potential that otherwise would have failed – she’s an incredible woman, really. I’m surprised you haven’t heard of her.”

Edelgard Hresvelg – the name definitely didn’t ring any bells, and Claude had been keeping track of all of the dubious business owners across the country, learning their secrets and working out their weaknesses should he ever find himself facing off against them. Hresvelg was a name that had not yet made it on to his list, but then that hardly came as a surprise when she seemed to be operating so charitably.

“Oh, well, we’re not actually from here,” Claude shrugged. “We’re originally from Leicester, but we heard that this was the best publishing company in all of Fódlan so we came to give it a bash. This writing stuff is easy. We churned that manuscript out in like, a week.”

“Yeah, but if this doesn’t work out, my dad will probably just pay for us to publish it anyway,” Sylvain added.

Manuela’s face changed again, her eyebrow twitched and then she huffed a sigh of relief and pointed behind them. “You’re up.”

“Oh, awesome,” Sylvan grinned, affirming that the man at the desk had in fact been waiting for them with a bored stare. “Good luck, Miss. Manuela. Hope to see your work on the shelves right next to ours.”

“I can hardly contain my excitement,” she said, tucking her hair behind her ear, sounding entirely as though she couldn’t care less whether or not Brett and Cody got run over by a truck the moment they stepped outside the building.

“Good morning, welcome to Aegir Publishing, do you have an appointment?”

“We most certainly do,” Claude said. They’d called in the day previous – Lysithea had worked her magic to get them moved up the list for a ‘high priority appointment’. Whatever that meant. It had been difficult; Manuela was certainly not wrong when she said the whole company was horrendously busy. Lysithea had to forcibly cancel a few people’s appointments to get them moved up the list in time. Maybe they’d even done Manuela a favour in the process. “Cody and Brett,” he said by way of identification, procuring a false ID card to back him up.

The man behind the desk nodded and tapped at his keyboard. “You have an appointment with Petra Macneary at ten.”

“That is correct,” Claude grinned, tucking his fake ID back in to his pocket. “I know we’re a little early.” They were an hour early, in fact. But Claude had made sure of that – he wanted to fit in as much investigation as possible before they began.

“Yes,” the man said. “Not to worry, there’s a decent waiting area on the sixth floor for you to make use of, since your meeting will take place on the tenth floor. Keep an eye on the board, and you’ll know when Miss. Macneary is ready to see you.”

“Neat, thanks.”

They both winked at Manuela on their way over to the elevators, and the moment they got inside, Claude pressed the button for the sixth floor, sank back against the cool metal walls and grinned at Sylvain. Sylvain smiled back as though he was having the time of his life. Which he probably was, Claude surmised – he’d been used to the boring life of a security guard after all, and when compared to the life of a retrieval artist, the thrill was probably addicting.

“_I’ve been looking in to the Hresvelg Empire,” _Lysithea said. “_This woman is seriously incredible. Did you know she took over the company when she was sixteen? According to this article, the Empire was corrupt, full of rich businessmen taking advantage of her father’s old age and laxity. When she took over, she completely overturned all of the staff, regardless of their standing and wealth, and built the company back up from the ground.”_

“Wow,” Claude said after a low whistle, “sounds intense.”

“_Yeah,” _Lysithea confirmed. “_Apparently it was huge local news. Lots of people weren’t happy that they’d lost their jobs, but then she hired over three thousand new employees across Adrestia from all different backgrounds and started investing and creating opportunities for hundreds more.” _There was a pause in which Claude could hear Lysithea’s furious clicking and tapping through the line. “_Why have I never heard of this before?”_

“Don’t know,” Claude frowned. “You’d think it would have made countrywide news. Maybe they had the mother of all PR teams on the case.”

“_Do you think she might have funded someone to steal the locket?”_ Felix asked.

“_That’s a possibility. She certainly has the means and the money. But I don’t see why it would be important enough to her to do so, not unless it held personal importance to her.”_

_“So _she_ could be the one who stole it? Edelgard could be the Flame Emperor?”_

_“Again, it’s just a theory. A possibility. We’ll have to do more digging. She could be helping a friend, she could be acting on her own behalf, it could be someone else entirely– we won’t know until we get all of the facts, and it’ll do no good to assume.”_

The elevator doors rolled open signalling an end to the mostly one sided conversation – cameras were everywhere after all, and Claude would look awfully suspicious talking to himself in the elevator for _too_ long. When they stepped out on to the sixth floor, Claude’s jaw almost dropped. It looked more like a shopping centre than a waiting room – the whole floor seemed to have been overtaken by prettily decorated tables sitting outside cafés and other little shops housing expensive jewellery and the like.

“A _decent_ waiting area?” Sylvain asked, incredulous. “This looks more like an airport lounge.”

He wasn’t wrong either – there was a display board hanging from the ceiling marking appointment times and when their scheduled meeting was ready to be undertaken. Cody and Brett’s names had just appeared at the bottom of the list, scheduled on time for ten a.m.

“What the hell is _your_ guy doing with his money if he can’t even afford a _vending_ machine?” Claude grumbled, making a beeline for the café.

“_Making wise choices,”_ Felix supplied.

“Damn, I wish I’d recorded _that_ for him to hear,” Sylvain sighed, keeping his voice low despite the room being relatively lively with conversation. “He’d probably give you all a raise for getting that out of Felix.”

“_Oh don’t worry, I keep a record of all of this should we need to hear something again,” _Lysithea said. "He can pay us some more money if he wants it _that_ badly." Claude swore he heard Felix say something like ‘_Fuck you all’_ under his breath in the distance, but he couldn’t be sure.

Claude fished around in his back pocket for his wallet as they approached the open doors of a café, the smell of baking pastry and coffee making his stomach growl in anticipation.

“Oh _god_, this place smells amazing,” Sylvain near moaned when they stepped inside. It was just as sparsely decorated as the rest of the building – white walls, modern touches – and extremely far removed from the richly historic surroundings. It was also full of people sitting at tables, pouring over laptops, chugging coffee as though their life depended on it, with faces that told stories of sleepless nights and stressed deadlines. Not a single one of them looked up when Sylvain and Claude entered, some of them even had headphones on, and only occasionally looked up to check the placement of their names on the waiting board.

“Bet they’re working on something actually worth reading,” Sylvain said, eyes sweeping over the customers. “And here we are,” he looked down at the paper in his hands, “with ‘The Fuck-it List’.”

“Hey, bro, don’t discredit us like that,” Claude clapped a hand on his shoulder. “I’ve definitely read worse.”

“_I sincerely hope you’re joking,” _Lorenz said, “_because you only have two chapters and a summary and already I feel as though I might never know true peace ever again.”_

“I wish I was,” Claude sighed, thinking back to the week-long binge of erotic fiction he’d found himself indulging in during a particularly interesting library job a few years back. If there was one thing he’d learned from the experience that had helped him on _this_ job, it was that plot was definitely not necessary, nor was it preferred over gratuitous amounts of excruciatingly detailed smut. “Anyway, what do you want, dude? I’ll treat you. Bro’s honour. Or code, or whatever.”

“Oh, dude, like a bro-date? You gotta stop being so nice and handsome, or you’re gonna give me a serious friendship boner.”

“_Please shut the fuck up. You don’t have to do it when nobody is around,”_ Lysithea groaned.

“There are a sufficient amount of people around,” Claude said. “Besides, you shouldn’t even be talking to us, go and bother Leonie or something.”

“_Can’t,”_ Lysithea said simply. _“She turned off her earpiece to talk to a cute girl and said, and I quote, ‘Leave me the fuck alone until further notice’.”_

“Geez, you can’t take her anywhere,” Claude muttered. “Still, we have serious grown up work to do now, so go and play with your toys or something.”

“_You’d better fucking mean my computer, Claude.”_

“Of course. How stupid do you think I am?”

_“Extremely.”_

“Brett!” Claude ignored her to say. “What’cha having?”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

\--SYLVAIN—

Sylvain sat in the Aegir Publishing café, sipping on his coffee, and thought that maybe, this was the most fun he’d had in a very long time. Working for Dimitri could be boring at the best of times, and since the incident with Cornelia had settled in its entirety, there wasn’t much to do around the office other than wait for Dimitri to finish his paperwork. Which wasn’t to say that Sylvain was hoping for another assassination attempt, just that he wished the days would go by without the most interesting part of it being Dimitri’s toilet break.

Joining Claude’s retrieval team had brought a light back to his life he hadn’t known had diminished until he took that moment in the café to really appreciate what he was doing. He was _under cover_ on a _secret reconnaissance mission_ with actual _spies, _drinking _coffee _with the most prolific retrieval artist of his generation_._ He’d dyed his hair! He’d wired himself up with an earpiece and microphone, and there was a little girl miles away calling him an idiot! Twelve-year-old Sylvain would have exploded if he’d found out this could ever have been a possibility. And for all of his moaning and groaning, Sylvain knew that Felix felt the same way too. His frown wasn’t as pronounced, and there was a definite twinkle in his eye when Claude told him he’d be infiltrating alongside Lorenz, a twinkle that Sylvain had not seen since Felix had tackled one of Cornelia’s men to the ground years ago.

“We have forty minutes,” Claude said under his breath, now extremely wary of the close proximity of the surrounding customers. “Go and talk to as many people as you can about Edelgard and what’s been going on in Aegir Publishing over the last few weeks. Meet me back here when our names come up on the board.”

Sylvain drained the last of his coffee and shovelled down the remainder of his strawberry cake. “You got it, Cody.”

“_I’m turning off your earpieces. We’ll be able to hear you, but you won’t hear us, or each other. It’ll make it easier to get in character.”_

Sylvain nodded, which in retrospect was probably stupid, since the only people who could see Sylvain’s face were the people in the café, but Lysithea didn’t say anything, and pretty soon, the background noise of the hotel room cut off completely and Sylvain was left with the hum of the coffee machine working behind the counter.

Trying to talk to any single person inside the café was probably a bust idea. They not only had headphones on, but their expressions _clearly_ read ‘talk to me and you’ll die in seven seconds’. Sylvain didn’t particularly enjoy conversing with people who were vehemently wishing for his death, so he ventured out in to the waiting room and picked a spot next to a guy whose leg was bouncing nervously in an erratic rhythm and looked seconds away from crying.

“What’s up,” Sylvain said, offering his hand. “I’m Brett.”

The guy looked at him, eyes wide like a deer caught in headlights. “Stahl,” he said eventually, taking Sylvain’s hand in an extremely loose handshake.

“No need to be so nervous, dude. What’s the worst that could happen? They tell you your story is a steaming pile of horse shit and you start again?”

Stahl winced and shrunk in on himself, gripping the paper manuscript in his hands tightly. “Uh, yeah?”

“Dude, you gotta have more confidence in yourself. Here, look, I’ve got the next bestseller! I’m talking there’s gonna be a movie, a really bad sequel, and ten years down the line, a reboot that’ll cause extreme discourse amongst fans. What about you? What’s your dream?” Sylvain asked.

“Uh, just to get it published, really,” Stahl said.

“What? Dude, that’s so simple. Don’t you want like, ungodly amounts of fame? Thousands of people pledging their genitals to you? What else do you become an author for?”

Stahl looked physically pained and shuffled a little further away from Sylvain. “Sounds like you’d prefer to be a rock star,” he mumbled.

“Nah. I don’t have the vocal range,” Sylvain said, thrusting ‘The Fuck-it List’ in to Stahl’s hands. “Here, I’ll read yours, and you read mine, and then we’ll both feel better about ourselves.”

Sylvain almost forgot about the monstrosity he’d written, and the second he handed it over felt instant regret. Stahl looked wholly too innocent to read such filth, but then Sylvain’s character was supposed to be everybody’s worst nightmare – he couldn’t forget that. If anything, he needed to amp it up a little more.

Stahl handed over his own manuscript warily, eyeing Sylvain as though he might run off with his genius and pawn it off to the highest bidder, and after reading the summary, Sylvain could tell this kid was seriously good at writing. His concepts and characters were already drawing him in; something about dragons and heroes and swords. If he had more time, he might have spent the entirety of it picking Stahl’s brain about where the rest of the plot was headed.

“This sounds amazing. Seriously dude, people are gonna find you and your huge brain irresistible. I know I do,” he winked.

Stahl looked up from Sylvain’s summary with an expression that couldn’t quite choose whether to be embarrassed, nervous, or disgusted. “Thanks, but that’s not really the goal,” he said.

“Really though? Isn’t that _everyone’s_ goal? I’m trying to take that baby all the way to Edelgard herself.”

“Edelgard Hresvelg?” Stahl asked, rearranging ‘The Fuck-it List’ in to the correct order and handing it back over.

“The one and only. She’s probably going to take one look at me and my masterpiece and throw herself at my feet. I mean, could you blame her? I was a model for a few years, you know. For an underwear company.”

“Doesn’t she have a wife?” Stahl interrupted desperately, wringing his hands together. “Over in Varley? I’m pretty sure they got married like, a year ago.”

“Oh really? Well, doesn’t matter. Her wife will probably feel the same when she feasts her eyes upon chapter seven.”

_God_, he really hoped he never had to see Stahl again after this; he was already looking at Brett as though he didn’t deserve the air he breathed, which to be fair, wasn’t a totally unreasonable thought to have. But Sylvain couldn’t let that stop him – he’d already gotten some valuable information on Edelgard. Granted it would probably have turned up in a surface-level internet search, but Sylvain was grasping at whatever he could to remind himself that this was for a good cause – for Dimitri.

“Ah, OK, does that mean it gets better by chapter seven then?” Stahl asked, innocently hopeful.

_Ouch._

“If by better you mean astronomically sexier, then yes. Yes it does, my friend.”

“Oh.”

“Right? I can’t believe my buddy Cody and I even came up with this stuff. It’s like we were possessed by the God of Sex himself. What was his name again? Sexicus, or something.”

“Himeros?” Stahl supplied.

“Yeah, that guy. So what did you think? Like, tell me honestly. I can take it.”

Stahl sighed and ran a hand through his hair. He was probably toying with ideas, deciding upon which route he wanted to take with his feedback. Eventually, he said, “You know what? It’s great. I think you’ll go really far with it.”

Sylvain knew that actually meant ‘_that is the most terrible thing I’ve ever read and I really, truly, wish you would leave me alone,’ _but he had a job to do and a locket to find.

“Really? I heard that Mr. Aegir is quite a stickler for perfection. I mean, my dad could just pay for me to publish it anyway, but I’d like the recognition, you know?”

“Uh, yeah? I guess. I mean, I’ve had a meeting with Mr. Aegir before. He read my first treatment and liked it, so I guess I’ve passed that test.” Stahl’s gaze then fell to his feet. “That was a few months ago though, he’s been so busy that the process has taken a lot longer than I thought it would.”

“Huh, you know, that’s the second time I’ve heard that today,” Sylvain said with a frown. He chose his next words carefully, not wanting to sound as though this was precisely the type of information he was in the market for hearing. “What do you think’s got him so busy? New upcoming best seller? Relationship on the rocks?”

Stahl shrugged, but looked way less pained, clearly glad to be talking about something other than Brett’s disgustingly privileged little life. “Don’t know. But I don’t think it has anything to do with publishing. They haven’t released any new works in over a month. Seems like they’re catching up on lost time now. I’ve never seen it so packed in here.”

“Huh, maybe that gives us a better chance at publication,” Sylvain pointed between the two of them and raised a suggestive eyebrow. “Speaking of publication, I actually came up with a couple of improvements you could make to your story if you want to hear them.”

Stahl’s face fell. “Not really.”

“Great! So my first idea was for that hot chick? What was her name again? Carly?”

“Camilla,” Stahl muttered.

“Camilla! Yeah! You could _really_ go to town on her physical description. I’m talking give her the hugest, most impressive rack you could possibly imagine. Everybody loves boobs, right? And I bet _all_ the readers would like to know that the protagonist has an exceptionally large set.”

Stahl grimaced.

“Second, that guy Zero - he needs a really cool and sexy eyepatch. Because like, no homo or anything but I’d definitely bang him if he—”

“Oh! It’s my turn!” Stahl immediately jumped to his feet and his eyes lit up as though a thousand gods had just blessed him with the greatest luck imaginable. He gathered his bag and shoved his papers inside. “Nice talk, Brett. Good luck with your… uh... book.”

“Of course, no problem, man. Right back at you.”

Sylvain watched Stahl head off towards the office rooms – he could only have disappeared faster if he’d broken in to a sprint.

Almost simultaneously, the communication line clicked back on.

“_You are disgusting,”_ was all Lysithea said before the line went quiet again.

Sylvain couldn’t stop the smile from spreading across his face as he leaned back and looked at his watch. Twenty-five minutes still remained before their appointment – that was plenty of time to gather some more intel. A whole room full of people remained unintroduced to Brett, and Sylvain was determined to meet as many of them as he could before Brett disappeared. Hopefully forever.

Over the other side of the waiting room, he could see Claude locked in conversation with an elderly woman who Sylvain could _definitely_ have been fooled in to believing was Miss Marple herself. Claude seemed to be particularly interested in whatever she was saying, whether or not he was just being polite, Sylvain couldn’t tell, but he hoped that she was at least providing them with something a little more solid than Edelgard being married or Aegir Publishing having halted production for ten minutes.

Sylvain undid one of the buttons of his blazer and got back on to his feet, scanning the room for his next victim. He found a few people willing to talk - made idle conversation with a green haired, middle aged man trying to get a series of children’s stories published for his daughter, and very pointedly did _not_ tell him the premise of his own story lest god strike him down where he stood for indecency. There was also a pretty interesting conversation had with a guy who claimed he was from a parallel universe and was publishing a story about the ordeal, and Sylvain was left standing even more uncertain about his place in the universe than ever before, but with no more information on Edelgard or Aegir Publishing.

With ten minutes to spare, Sylvain hit the jackpot. A young woman, probably around his age, stormed out of one of the office rooms and made a beeline for the café. She threw her bags down at one of the tables with a huff of irritated air, and then sank in to a chair, cursing under her breath.

Perfect.

A disgruntled customer would be more than happy to trash talk Aegir Publishing. Sylvain just had to hope she would find him charming enough to divulge that information and not insult him in to next week. That shouldn’t be too difficult; he wasn't one to brag, but he was something of a sweet talker in his prime.

“Good morning, beautiful,” he said with a smile, sliding in to the chair opposite hers. “Having a rough day?”

The woman looked up from where she’d rested her head in her hands and regarded him with a stare that Sylvain would wager only the mud beneath her feet ever found itself the victim of.

“Ugh and what are _you_ supposed to be? A clown sent to make my day even worse?”

Sylvain blinked at her. Maybe he’d lost his touch. “Uh, no?”

She clicked her tongue. “Then what do you want, Bozo? I’m trying to have a breakdown here.”

“I’m here to make your day undeniably better,” he tried, leaning back in his seat with a wink.

“Then you’re not doing a very good job. Buy me a coffee or something.”

Sylvain considered her. “I will if you’ll tell me your name first,” he said.

“Selena,” she snapped. “I’ll have a cappuccino.”

He made a note to claim back the $5.69 for the overpriced coffee from Dimitri later, and complied, leaving Selena alone for a moment to complete her order. By the time he got back, she was typing furiously on her phone, and didn’t even look up when Sylvain placed the coffee down in front of her.

“I’m Brett, by the way,” he said.

“Don’t care. Thanks for the coffee though.”

The air between them was quiet for a moment. Selena clearly wanted nothing to do with him, and it was extremely apparent that his flirtation methods were not going to work this time around. Sylvain slumped back in his seat and dropped the majority of his act. “You get rejected in there or something?”

That made her look up from her phone. She pushed her red hair out of her eyes, scowled at him, and then returned to typing.

“Ha, knew it. Not everyone can write masterpieces, sweetheart. Some people are just more naturally gifted than others. Don’t take it to heart.”

“I’m not an author,” she said with a roll of her eyes. “And I don’t care if you are, so please don’t start talking to me about your disgusting male-fantasy erotic novel or whatever. I’m not interested.”

Sylvain almost lost composure at how unbelievably accurate she’d been in assessing his character, but managed to hold on to a shred of it long enough to say with a smug smile, “Don’t worry, you’ll be hearing all about ‘The Fuck-it List’ when it comes to a bookstore near you.”

“‘_The Fuck-it List’? _Oh _god_ that’s even worse than I’d imagined,” she said, and then actually looked up properly to give him a once over. “Actually,” she said after a moment, “I’m not surprised at all.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Sylvain asked. “That I look every bit as sexy as you’d imagine the author of such genius to be?”

“That you look like the type of clown to write such dog shit,” she clarified.

Sylvain remained unfazed, smile still infuriatingly undefeated. “That’s an odd way to flirt.”

Selena made a face. “I’m _definitely_ not flirting with you.”

“That’s what they all say,” Sylvain half sang, leaning back and settling his hands behind his head.

“Oh yeah? Do they also say that you’re an insufferable cup of dick slime? Because that’s what I was about to say next.”

Sylvain could almost hear Felix laughing at him from back at the hotel. He’d be calling him ‘an insufferable cup of dick slime’ for the rest of their lives, no doubt. That was the last thing Sylvain needed – Felix with a new repertoire of names to call him when he didn’t know what else to say. Actually, the more he thought about it, flirting with Selena was a lot like flirting with Felix - a minefield. Except, Felix’s hardened stare was usually decorated with an unmistakable blush, whereas Selena still looked at him as though he were as insignificant as an insect.

“Hm, no. They usually just leave. But they always come back, and then the rest is history, sweetheart.”

“Call me sweetheart once more and I’ll break your legs.”

“Could you do that though? You look kind of small.”

Selena laughed, dry and scathing. “I could throw your lanky ass out of the window in a heartbeat, _sunshine,” _she sneered. “Why do you think I came here today? I came for a security position interview.”

_Bingo. _This was definitely the type of information they needed. At least he wasn’t enduring the humiliation for no good reason.

“That’s kind of hot,” Sylvain said, and Selena slammed her empty cup of coffee down on to the table with a threatening rattle of chinaware. “But if I recall correctly, you were rejected. Must have been a reason for that, no?”

“It wasn’t because of me, you fucking leech.”

“It’s not me, it’s you,” Sylvain sighed wistfully. “You have no idea how many times I’ve heard_ that _before.”

“It _wasn’t,_” Selena snapped, her face turning red in either rage, or embarrassment, Sylvain wasn’t sure. “If you must know, shit-for-brains, my friend over in Hresvelg said that a large majority of Aegir Publishing’s security staff recently moved over there for the foreseeable future.”

“Why would they do that?” Sylvain asked, pulse quickening in anticipation.

“Don’t know, and I don’t really care. I thought that with the shortage over here, it would be easier to get hired. Guess I thought _wrong _though, because Mr. Shampoo-Ad-Aegir thinks that he’s got more than enough staff to securely watch over a place this large, when I know for a _fact_ that he hasn’t. Men are fucking idiots.”

“Did you tell him that?”

“Course I did,” Selena scoffed. “And do you know what the best part was? I think he wanted to get security to escort me from the premises, but I’d bet my life savings that he didn’t have anyone left to call on.”

Sylvain laughed, a pure mix of elation at having found something extremely valuable, and genuine amusement at Selena’s anecdote. “Maybe you should broaden your horizons,” Sylvain offered. “Look for somewhere further afield. I heard there are places in Fhirdiad hiring.”

“Maybe you should mind your own business, salmon boy. I’ve already spoken to you for longer than what’s probably healthy.”

“Ah, yes of course, my doctor did say I’m better digested in small doses. People tend to fall for me too hard the longer they’re exposed. It’s a curse I have to bear for looking this incredible.”

“Goddess give me strength,” Selena muttered.

Sylvain was about to open his mouth again when a hand settled itself in his shoulder. “Brett, my man! It’s time for our reckoning!”

“Cody!” Sylvain twisted around and found Claude behind him grinning from ear to ear. Surely enough, their name had moved up the board to the ‘Expected’ column.

“Oh, fuck. There’s two of them,” Selena groaned.

“It has been fun, but, alas I must leave you. Till next time, fair maiden,” Sylvain got up and half-bowed. “Try not to think of me too much in my absence. I know it’ll be hard, but stay strong.”

“I literally cannot wait until you disappear forever,” Selena said, “and I hope your manuscript gets shredded on the way to the office.”

“You can just say ‘good luck’, babe, it’s OK.”

Selena ignored him and turned to Claude. “Hey, Cody, you need to book your ‘bro’ in for a hearing test, I think there’s something wrong with him.”

“Nah, he’s good,” Claude said, throwing an arm over Sylvain’s shoulders. He squeezed Sylvain tighter, something unspoken in the gesture. “_Really_ good.”

They said their goodbyes; Sylvain blew Selena a kiss that she caught, spat on, and then threw to the ground. Claude pulled him in the direction of the elevators, and they waited for an empty one to claim for their ride up to the tenth floor where Petra Macneary’s office was lying in waiting.

Claude held up a finger before speaking, checking something on his phone – probably Linhardt’s app – and then let out a breath when he was satisfied. “Lys told me what Selena said,” Claude grinned, knocking Sylvain’s shoulder. “Nice work, Brett.”

“Told you I was a master,” he winked.

“_Don’t feed his ego,”_ Felix’s voice came through and Sylvain’s smile widened. “_He won’t shut up about this for the next ten years.”_

“Jealousy is a disease, Fe. But it’s OK, I’ll blow you lots of kisses when I get back.”

“_Shut the fuck up.”_

“Aww, Lysithea, is he blushing?”

“_Ew, I don’t know. Don’t get me involved in your weird flirting games.”_

_“He definitely is,”_ Lorenz said.

“Thanks, Lorenz.”

“As fun as this is,” Claude said, “we’re here. But before we go in, just know that our objective now is to get as much information on this weird security issue as possible. Turn up the insufferable dial to one billion, because we need to see the manager.”

Sylvain started to limber up, rolling his shoulders and clicking his neck to the side. “I’m just getting started.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tysm for reading and for all of your lovely comments and kudos ;_; it makes me so happy to know people enjoy this nonsense lmao
> 
> as always, pls come talk to me on twitter @ berriesmangoes !!


	8. THE AEGIR BUILDING - PART TWO

CHAPTER EIGHT: CLAUDE

THE AEGIR BUILDING – PART TWO

Petra’s office was obviously like a second home to her. There were memories decorating the entirety of her desk - mostly in the form of photographs of her family, friends, and pets, but there was also a little snow globe containing famous landmarks from Brigid, and a novelty mug that read ‘You CAN shoot two birds with one arrow’, newly filled to the brim with a steaming, pink herbal tea. She’d also taken to decorating the inside somewhat; over by the window there was a sofa full of brightly patterned cushions, and a painting hanging on the wall nearby of a forest in full bloom. It reminded Claude of Marianne’s therapist’s office – obviously designed to make everyone in it feel somewhat calmer, yet infinitely distracting with all of the various trinkets and decorations.

Petra stood up behind her desk and offered her hand out to Claude, taking it in a firm shake. “Good morning,” she said with a polite smile and a Brigid accent that told Claude the snow globe wasn’t just a tourist’s gift. “I’m Petra Macneary. Welcome to Aegir Publishing.”

“Cody Richards,” Claude said, and then pointed to Sylvain. “And this is my buddy, Brett Garrison.”

Sylvain waved upon his mention, bestowing Petra with a dazzling smile and an embarrassing display of finger-guns. “I like your brooch.”

It was a statement piece upon the blank whiteness of her shirt – a bejewelled red flower with a black centre, snuggly fastened upon the top button. Claude didn’t miss the way her eyes flickered downwards upon its mention, nor did he miss the way her hand darted up to smooth a finger vacantly over the accessory.

_Interesting. _It certainly didn’t match her aesthetic, in clothing or in decoration. So, did that make it a gift from a loved one? A friend? An accomplice? The possibilities were endless.

“Thank you,” she said curtly as they took seats around her desk. “It is a pleasure to meet you.”

_Let’s see how long that sentiment lasts once we start talking,_ Claude couldn’t help but think, because Sylvain seemed to have a knack for devising the worst thing possible thing to say at any given time. But perhaps that was just a byproduct of his time spent with Felix. That kid could make winning the lottery something to frown about.

As though demonstrating the fact, Sylvain unfortunately put a hand to his chest and said, “I know.”

“You were quite lucky to get an appointment today,” Petra continued as though Sylvain hadn’t spoken. “I was fully booked up until yesterday evening. There were quite a few last minute cancellations.”

“Well, how about that,” Claude grinned. “Maybe it was fate.”

Petra returned the enthusiasm. “Maybe, so, Mr. Richards.”

As nice as she seemed, there was something about Petra that told Claude swindling information out of her would not be as easy as it had been prior to this meeting. If she had something to do with this whole mess – which Claude couldn’t rule out entirely – then there was no doubt in Claude’s mind that Petra would remain tight lipped on the matter unless he managed to lead her unknowingly in to one of his traps. A feat not easily accomplished when next to nothing was known about the target. Still, no information was also plenty of information – it meant that there was something to hide.

“So we hear you’re in to publishing masterpieces,” Sylvain started, leaning back obnoxiously in his chair. It groaned under the weight of his long limbs, obviously not used to such carelessness, but Sylvain didn’t seem to care an ounce. He looked a few seconds away from throwing his feet up on to Petra’s desk and taking a nap. “Well it just so happens that my buddy and I are sitting on one.”

“We milked each other’s creative juices dry,” Claude nodded, adding a wholly unnecessary and utterly grotesque hand gesture for good measure. “You’ll never read anything else like it.”

“Um, right,” Petra said, customer-service-smile never faltering. She glanced at something on her computer screen, and then cleared her throat, turning to Claude to say, “Well I must speak frankly, we don’t usually get abrupt appointments like this. Do you gentlemen not have an agent to represent you?”

“Nah,” Sylvain said with a flippant wave of the hand. “We’re all about that DIY process, you know? Organic shit. Saving the planet.”

“Totally,” Claude agreed, holding up a peace sign. “We tried to get it published online first, but then we found out that you actually have to get someone to edit it for you. Then you _also_ have to advertise it. And, get this, they have the audacity to ask _money_ for that shit! Isn’t it enough that they just get to read our genius in the process? It's all just an elaborate scheme to finagle us out of Brett’s father’s hard earned money.”

“I’m not sure it—”

“Anyway,” Claude cut Petra off and watched her eyebrow twitch slightly. “We couldn’t get anyone to help us for free, so we decided it would be better to just hand it over to a publishing company and let them do all the work. We’ve already exhausted our brains enough during this process.” Claude sighed for emphasis and then leaned back in his chair, mirroring Sylvain’s laid-back stance with his hands behind his head. “We’re going to have to spend the next year relaxing and rejuvenating on our private yacht if we want enough brain-sperm to ejaculate a new sequel in to the public’s eagerly awaiting hands.”

“Yes, well, let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Petra said, rummaging around her desk until she found a pair of glasses. She slid them on and then leaned forwards slightly, hand open and expectant. “I’m afraid it’s very uncommon for us to just accept authors after one brief meeting – first, I’ll have to see your book treatment. Do you have one on hand?”

“Do you think we’re amateurs? Of course we have a treatment,” Sylvain scoffed and slid the paper over to Petra. She picked it up, eyes scanning the front page that Claude knew all too well displayed the name ‘The Fuck-it List’ in huge blocky font and nothing more. “Now you may be wondering how two wildly handsome guys like us could come up with something so profound and symbolic,” Sylvain started.

“That hadn’t crossed my mind, no,” Petra said distantly as she flipped over to the next page and continued reading. To her credit, she managed to keep her expression blank for the majority of the endeavour. It was only when the corners of her mouth twitched downwards slightly towards the end of the first paragraph that Claude could tell that her reaction was not a positive one – as though it ever could be.

“OK, well maybe you were thinking that you can’t wait to read the next chapter, in which case you’d—”

Petra closed the document and handed it back over to Sylvain. “I wasn’t thinking that either.”

“But it’s good stuff though, right?” he asked, eyebrow raised in an invitation to agree. “My buddy Josh said it was good, and everyone knows that Josh doesn’t lie. He cheats on his girlfriend, sure, but he doesn’t _lie._”

Petra removed her glasses and pinched the bridge of her nose; the gesture took Claude back to his childhood, and to his Aunt Judith right before she was about to bestow upon young Claude a brutally honest home truth. She sat back in her chair with a raised eyebrow, and Claude, for some unknown reason, actually felt nervous on his manuscript’s behalf. Petra didn’t look like the type of person to mince her words – they were about to endure a slaughtering.

“I’m not sure ‘good’ is the adjective I’d use here,” she said, voice unsettlingly jovial despite their best efforts to disappoint her. Maybe Brett and Cody weren’t the worst customers she’d ever had to deal with. The mere thought made Claude shudder.

“Yeah come on, Brett, wasn’t it you who said we should stop selling ourselves short?” Claude sat up straight and clapped Sylvain on the shoulder. “Remember what your dad said?”

“‘_When will you stop bringing shame and misfortune upon this family and finally fucking do something useful with your life, son?’”_

Claude stopped for a moment, internally debating on whether or not Sylvain was still acting. “No, dude!” he said hesitantly. “The bit about probably being able to get away with murder if you actually applied yourself!”

Sylvain sat up too, slamming his fist down on to Petra’s desk. She didn’t even flinch – just moved to stop a pen from rolling off the edge after the impact. “You know what, Cody? You’re right. I’m gonna apply myself liberally all over this like a generous coating of lube. You meant to say it was ‘amazing’, right, Miss. Petra?”

“Definitely not, no. I was actually going to call it trashy and tasteless,” Petra said simply.

“_Tasteless?_” Sylvain blanched. “What do you mean it’s tasteless? There’s so much flavour! Just there,” he said, pointing to the treatment lying atop the desk, “in chapter two, Sally gets a whole mouthful of Brian’s cu—”

“What Brett means to say,” Claude cut in, putting a hand on his shoulder in consolation, “is that you’re obviously mistaken if you think this book isn’t going to be an instant best seller. Don’t you remember that craze a while back where people were getting it off on public transport because they couldn’t put that one erotic book down? That’s us. We’re the next erotic sensation.”

“That sounds hot, bro,” Sylvain said under his breath.

“Hell yeah, dude.”

Petra didn’t waste a second contemplating Claude’s rebuttal. “We don’t accept erotic fiction.”

“What?” Claude frowned. “Why? Everyone deserves to jack off.”

“Mr. Aegir has a strict ‘no erotica’ policy.”

Sylvain threw his head back and laughed. “What kind of virgin has a ‘no erotica’ policy?” When Petra abstained from responding, Sylvain muttered an incredulous ‘_wow_’ under his breath, and then continued, “Listen, I know you’re just upset because you don’t want to pass up on this—”

“—No, I’m really not, Mr. Garrison—”

“—opportunity of a lifetime, so I’ll cut you a deal, but only because you’re pretty – no other reason. We’ll take out a few of the blowjob scenes, and _maybe_ the scene where Sally gets rawed at the gym, but that’s all we can allow. We have to stay true to our vision, right bro?”

Claude had to hand it to Sylvain – he was excellent at set up. Not only did he have Claude close to firmly believing that they really _were_ pitching their own book, but Petra looked as though her unbreakable façade of professionalism might start crumbling at any moment. All that remained now was for Claude to follow through. And he knew just what to say next.

“Absolutely,” Claude confirmed. “But we can’t let too many blowjob scenes go – they’re integral to Sally’s character development. You see,” he said turning to Petra, “her strength as a character is determined by how quickly she can make Brian—”

“OK, that’s quite enough,” Petra said, standing. It was slight, but Claude was almost certain that he could hear the familiar tones of anger taking a hold of her voice. _Bingo._ “This appointment is over. We will not be investing in either of you. You can see yourselves out. Have a nice day, gentlemen, and may I suggest that you try your luck with another publishing house? I heard there’s one over in Fhirdiad that has much lower standards. You might find some luck there.”

Sylvain clicked his tongue. “Now, see, here’s my problem, lady. We came all the way over here just to meet with you today, to share this, quite frankly, _stupidly_ good idea,--”

“--_For free--” _Claude added.

“—_for free,_ thanks bro, and you’re just going to throw us out without even contemplating it?”

“Yes,” Petra said. “Ultimately, it’s my decision, and I don’t like your book. It’s… oh, how do they say it in Adrestia? Oh yes, _bad_.”

“Well, you’re just one person, and no offence intended, sweetheart, but I really don’t think women have the brain capacity to appreciate something of this calibre anyway.”

The ensuing silence was so painfully awkward that Claude almost broke character, and it certainly wasn’t made any easier by the innocently oblivious smile that Sylvain kept plastered on his face. Petra let out a deep, calming breath, and steadied herself before finally saying, “You know what, I’m just going to call s—”

Just as quickly as she had moved, she stopped mid-motion, hand hovering over the telephone on her desk. Claude would have bet his entire life savings that her next word would have been ‘security’, but everybody inside the office knew all too well that calling upon them was not an option. Petra’s face hardened and then she let out another dissatisfied sigh. A sigh that confirmed more about the state of Aegir Publishing’s internal affairs than anything Petra could have divulged verbally. 

“I’m going to call Mr. Aegir and get you an appointment with him today,” Petra said instead. “Since my tiny woman brain can’t comprehend the ‘deeper meaning’ lurking beneath the festering garbage you call prose, I’ll hand you over to him. I’m sure his big, manly, boss brain will be able to understand it just fine.”

_Perfect._

“That would be great,” Claude said. “I knew you’d understand.”

Petra huffed and stabbed the numbers in to the phone with such force that it was a miracle one of the buttons didn’t pop out. Claude was going to have to get some kind of apology card sent once this whole job was over; he was pretty certain that Petra would remember and despise their faces until the end of time. A pity, really. Petra seemed like an extremely interesting individual – Lysithea definitely would have gotten on with her quite well - but at least Claude had spared her from meeting Karen. Nobody deserved to meet Karen.

“Hey, wait,” Sylvain said, “isn’t he busy? Everybody around here has been saying the schedule is packed.”

Petra brought the phone up to her ear as it rang. “If you don’t mind sticking around, I’m sure he can make an exception for two upstanding gentlemen such as yourselves.”

“We have all the time in the world,” Claude grinned.

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

“_We don’t have all the time in the world, Claude,”_ Lysithea grumbled.

Claude sipped his second, much cheaper, cup of coffee and spread out across the backseat of the car with a satisfied sigh. This day was shaping up to be an interesting one indeed. Almost everything had gone according to plan – they’d gotten substantial amounts of information from Sylvain’s incessant badgering in the waiting room, and Petra had put them through to Mr. Aegir faster than Claude had anticipated. Claude had even picked up on several threads of information worth exploring in further detail, something that would, no doubt, keep him up well in to the night trawling the internet for.

Questions and possibilities floated around inside his head, and the answers existed somewhere among them, just waiting to be discovered. Claude just had to wade through the mud a little longer before everything started gaining clarity and the true retrieval plan could come to fruition.

“Sure we do,” Claude said. “Phase two doesn’t begin for another twelve hours.”

“_Four of which you’ll spend sitting around doing absolutely nothing,”_ Lysithea said. _“Surely we have enough information to just call it a day?”_

“The job is never done, Lys. You know that. Besides, I’d like to get to know all of the players a little better. See who we’re really up against. You know what it means if Ferdinand really _is_ involved.”

“_You and your need to know it all,”_ Lorenz sighed. “_One day it’ll get us in to more trouble than you are capable of talking us out of.”_

If that day were ever to arrive, he’d happily let Lorenz give him the lecture of a lifetime. But until that day came personally to wipe the smile off of his face, he was going to remain smug. “Your unwavering faith in me is as inspiring as ever, Lorenz.”

“_And the sarcasm you continue to employ to mock my genuine concern is just as steadfast. Lysithea has a point. Must you spend unnecessary time riling up more employees?”_

“At least one person inside that building is working with the Flame Emperor,” Claude reminded them. “The bug signal pinged in all three buildings, remember? Sure, it’s possible that it’s just some nerd sitting in the café with a laptop, but if it _is_ someone as important as Ferdinand Aegir himself, I want to meet him and rile him up while I’m still acting the insufferable douchebag.”

“_Wait, you’re acting?”_ Lysithea snickered.

“Lysithea, you’re killing your father.”

“_Fuck you. Lorenz is my new dad. He writes better stories.”_

_“A particularly well-trained rat could probably write something to exceed the ‘The Fuck-it List’.”_

Hearing Lorenz curse was always a delight, one that never failed to elicit a snort from Claude. ‘The Fuck-it List’ truly was the gift that just kept on giving.

_“Wow you’re right, maybe I should make Raphael my dad instead. He’d take way better care of me than both of you idiots combined.”_

Claude promptly pushed aside all thought pertaining to fatherhood with Lorenz, and instead decided to focus on literally anything else, because _boy_ was he glad that there weren’t any cameras around to record the sappy smile on his face. “Hey, it’s a good thing Sylvain’s not here right now, he’d be so upset if he heard you say such awful things about our brain baby.”

“_Where the hell is he, anyway? How long does it take to get food?” _Felix cut in.

Claude hummed and glanced out of the car window. Byleth and Sylvain had left to get some lunch over half an hour ago, but Claude wasn’t worried. If he’d learned anything about Sylvain over the last few days, it was that he was curious, and Byleth was probably the most interesting and mysterious person Claude had ever met. One day, he’d figure out the date of their birthday.

“Hey, chill out, knight boy. Map said it was a fifteen minute walk to the nearest place that serves takeaway. They’re probably enjoying the Adrestian scenery.”

“_Oh? But why do you suddenly care so much? All you’ve done this morning is complain about him,” _Lorenz scoffed. “_Or is there more to this tragic tale than what meets the eye? An unspoken romance, perhaps?”_

“_Perhaps,” _Felix began in a horrific imitation of Lorenz, _“you should mind your own damn business and get around to actually banging your boss before you try that shit on me.”_

Lorenz said something, but Claude didn’t hear it. He _almost_ spat his coffee out over the backseat, but instead, in an attempt to keep the burning hot liquid from ruining the rental car, ended up choking on it in a three minute long coughing fit. He had _not_ thought Felix was that perceptive.

“_You OK?_” Lysithea laughed.

When the heaving of his chest subsided, and his throat no longer felt as though it was consumed by flame, Claude managed a feeble, “I’m fine. Just choked a bit on my coffee. How is everything on your end?”

“_Everything’s working just fine,”_ Lysithea said, still reeling with laughter. “_You’re both still making me wish I’d never gotten this job in the first place. Though we still haven’t heard back from Leonie.”_

“What, _still?_ What is she even doing?”

It wasn’t as though they really needed to Leonie to go through with her end of the plan anymore, being that there wasn’t enough security on site to deal with her, but Claude _did _need to get her out of the building without giving away their cover.

“_She checked in about an hour ago to tell us that she was asking some lady called Sonia out on a date. Haven’t heard from her since.”_

“Oh my god,” Claude sighed and shook his head, “and she wonders why I don’t take her under cover more often. Let me know if you manage to get in contact. Try and let _her_ know that if she doesn’t want us to leave her behind, she needs to slip out whenever the opportunity presents itself. I know she’ll be disappointed, but we no longer have the need to rely on organised chaos as a last resort.”

_“Will do, but I can’t make any promises. We might have to send Byleth in to retrieve her.”_

_“_What’s Byleth doing?” Byleth’s voice came through on the line simultaneous to them opening the car door and slipping in to the driver’s seat alongside Sylvain. “Do I get to do something besides sit in the car? Exciting.”

Claude took the bag of takeaway food Sylvain offered him and almost groaned when the pleasant smell made his stomach growl in anticipation. “Sure, if your version of exciting is locating and extricating Leonie from a date in the waiting room of a busy publishing company.”

“I’m so proud of her,” Byleth sighed. “We should just let her stay. See what happens.”

“Yeah, no. As fun as that sounds, I’ve definitely learned my lesson. Besides, I don’t particularly fancy presiding over the impromptu elopement that would inevitably ensue if we were to leave her to her own devices. We have work to do."

“Oh yeah, of course,” Byleth said, smile turning wicked in the rear view mirror. “I forgot how much you enjoy watching Lorenz shuffle through vents in his infiltration gear.”

There was a disappointed click of the tongue on Lorenz’s end; another inevitability. “_Really, Claude? How uncouth.”_

“You wouldn’t say that if you saw yourself in your infiltration gear,” Claude mumbled. In Claude’s purely objective opinion, it was truly a sight to behold - Lorenz, clad in skin-tight black nylon was all legs and toned, lithe muscle, long hair tied up and twisted in to pretty patterns under Marianne’s expert hands, and sarcastic wit. Infiltration-Lorenz made Claude love his job more than he already did.

“_What was that?”_

“I’ve said nothing, my dear Lorenz. You must be experiencing some interference on your end.” For effect, Claude made some noises in the back of his throat to emulate a disrupted phone line.

“_Oh, must I?”_

“Yup.”

_“Funny how everything seems to be working just fine, and I could have sworn I heard you say something quite scandalous.”_

_“_Yeah,” he said absently, ceasing his noises and instead taking a large bite out of his burger, “how about that?”

“_You two are disgusting,”_ Lysithea groaned. “_Like, really, really, disgusting.”_

Claude refrained from gloating about how they could be _way _more disgusting should he ever find the courage to take the step and find out. There was no point in bragging when Claude had no plans for such a future any time soon – he was a gambling man, he enjoyed revelling in the huge pay outs that coincided with risk, but some things were just too precious to gamble away. His carefully cultivated relationship with Lorenz being one of them.

“Hey,” Claude said instead, words obscured by a mouthful of food. “That’s enough attitude young lady, or I’ll ground you for a year.”

“_What was that? You want me to delete all of your gaming accounts and pour dog piss all over your shirt collection?”_

Claude knew all too well that Lysithea never simply made jokes. He could fully expect a piss-ridden wardrobe come the morning if he didn’t amend himself now.

“I think you misheard me, Lys. What I actually said was: keep wholeheartedly insulting Lorenz and I’s inability to communicate our feelings and emotions in a productive manner, because it fills me with immense joy and reassurance.”

“_Yeah, that’s what I thought you said.__ Must have been some of that bastard interference again, huh.”_

“Goddess, I missed you guys,” Byleth sighed.

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

\--SYLVAIN—

“So the plan is to be so annoying that Ferdinand lets something slip accidentally?” Sylvain asked, trying to match Claude’s pace back towards the Aegir building. What Claude lacked in comparable height to Sylvain, he definitely made up for in speed. Or maybe Sylvain was just used to walking slowly, what with being on the constant lookout for potential threats to Dimitri and all. His guard hadn’t lowered since the Cornelia incident, and he supposed it never truly would ever again. He’d already looked over his shoulder over ten times since leaving the car, a habit both he and Felix had trouble breaking.

“Yup,” Claude said. “Tease him about the security situation, throw in some quips about Edelgard Hresvelg’s ownership of the company, make fun of him as a person, whatever. Hopefully, we’ll find out that he’s completely oblivious to the mastermind’s heist going on around him.”

They stopped at a crossing and Sylvain turned to Claude, a hesitant question burning on his tongue. It wasn’t as though he was really concerned for his own wellbeing – according to Felix, he had awful self-preservation skills – but he wasn’t overly fond of embarrassing himself and, by default, Dimitri in front of the cool retrieval kids. A wounded ego was far more painful than a gunshot wound or a busted eye. “And if we don’t?”

“Then this whole thing is about to get a whole lot more complicated. If CEOs of three major companies across Adrestia are involved in the taking of the locket, then they’ll have access to three times as many resources, three times the help, and triple the amount of funding. The richer and more influential a thief, the harder it is to take something back without it being a huge pain in the ass. Sure, a thief can be just as competent without any financial backing, but rich people do tend to lean towards the garish and overdramatic,” Claude said, expression wandering off in to something vacant as though contemplating a memory. He shuddered slightly and then shook his head. “What I’m saying, is that it would be a whole lot more time consuming and difficult to figure this whole mess out if Mr. Aegir is an important cog in a very large, very wealthy, machine.”

Sylvain bit the inside of his cheek. That was the last thing someone wanted to hear before entering a job – that they could leave it and instead be walking right in to the worst case scenario. But Claude didn’t seem particularly bothered, and Sylvain couldn’t help but wonder just how many cases of this calibre he’d worked before. It was strange really, when he thought about it, how much he already seemed to trust Claude despite knowing next to nothing about him or his weird little family. Everything had just fallen in to place without Sylvain giving it any real thought. Even Felix was gradually calming down and gaining something akin to acceptance.

Ultimately, Sylvain was having way too much fun for this whole thing to turn sour and difficult so quickly; things always became so much more annoying when they became difficult. “But it’s not impossible, right?”

Claude threw his head back and laughed. “Never impossible, my friend. Do I look like the kind of guy who would let ‘impossible’ stop him?”

“Uh, no? But then I’m not exactly sure what a guy like that is supposed to look like. Is he hot?”

“Definitely not as handsome as I am, that’s for sure,” Claude grinned as the crossing lit up. He set a brisk pace again, one that Sylvain had to jog slightly to catch up with, and then turned to say, “Hey, don’t go getting cold feet on me now, big guy. This’ll be the easiest thing you’ve had to do all day.”

“Dude, my feet have never been cold in my life.”

“Well good, because I need Brett and his warm feet on his A game.”

“_Can you please stop talking about feet? You’re making me feel nauseated.”_

“Sorry, Lysithea,” Sylvain said immediately. “Please don’t curse my firstborn or shave my dog.”

“_You don’t even have a dog,”_ Felix said.

“Please don’t shave my theoretical-future dog.”

“_Both scenarios are boring and totally lacking in creativity. I’d probably slash the tires of your ugly car and fill them with soup. Or slime. Or maybe both.”_

“How are you all still alive?” Sylvain muttered more to himself than anyone else. He could not fathom whether Lysithea was joking or not, but if Claude’s proudly amused expression was anything to go by, he’d opt for her being entirely serious in her threat making, which was all the more concerning.

“She keeps us all on our toes,” Claude said as they arrived outside of the Aegir building.

They stood just out of reach of the automatic doors, and Sylvain watched the crowd mill around the reception area like clockwork, performing the same organised routine as over four hours previous. With a roll of his shoulders – a task made much easier since they’d both shed their tight blazers– Claude addressed the team in a hushed whisper. “OK, everyone shut the fuck up, Brett and I have some big boy work to do.”

Without complaint, the background buzz of keyboard tapping and shuffling paper disappeared from his ear along with the rest of the team’s chatter, and Sylvain followed Claude inside the Aegir building, keeping close at his heels.

“If you happen to spot Leonie,” Claude said under his breath as they sauntered over to the elevators, “scowl at her in a way that suggests she should leave.”

He nodded, but after one glance over at the busy ground floor reception, he knew it would be impossible to spot her amongst the crowd, let alone capture her attention for more than a split second. Busy public areas always did make the perfect hiding spots. A fact learned early on in Sylvain’s development when an innocent game of hide-and-seek on a shopping trip had devolved in to a frantic hunt for three missing children and a teenager. Nearly four hours of hiding in a portable toilet later, a ten-year-old Sylvain had been escorted back to Felix’s father by an extremely disgruntled police officer to endure the lecture of a lifetime. He still recalled Rodrigue’s cold disappointment in his nightmares to the very day.

When they slipped inside the elevator, Sylvain relaxed against the wall, taking a moment to revert back in to his Brett-façade and readjust his hair in the mirror. He was glad to note that the temporary dye had held up considerably well despite all of the fiddling he'd done with it throughout the day.

Claude pulled out his phone again, and from the corner of his eye, Sylvain watched him check Linhardt’s app for the camera locations around Ferdinand’s office. Nothing seemed amiss. Not that Sylvain really knew what ‘amiss’ looked like, but Claude hadn’t hailed for a speedy retreat yet.

Ferdinand Aegir’s office was three floors higher than Petra’s had been, and was the only office on the whole floor. Decadence seemed to increase the higher up the building they ventured, the ninth floor being decorated with opulent accents of plush, red velvet in the waiting area’s sofas, and specks of gold glittering in the tiles beneath their sneaker-clad feet. It felt more like entering a royal chamber, with the same level of intricacy of detail as the hotel back at Gronder, and Sylvain couldn’t deny that it was definitely more aesthetically pleasing than Fhirdiad’s boringly modern minimalism.

With a nod and a grin, Claude led the way over to the small, much quieter reception desk tucked away in the corner – the last hurdle before they got to Mr. Aegir himself. The man behind the computer looked up and considered them both with unmistakable disdain. Obviously customer service had taken the largest hit in order to obtain such grandeur. The receptionist didn’t even bother to greet them, just went back to whatever it was that he was doing and then mumbled a, “Mr. Aegir is ready for you now,” after a few painful moments of silence.

Claude wasted no time in marching over to the office and thundering a knock upon the wooden door like the leader of a SWAT team. Had Sylvain been the one sitting inside, he might have been frightened out of at least ten years of his life. As it stood, he got to watch and listen in amusement as something beyond the door crashed to the ground, and Claude’s fist continued to rain upon the wood with enthusiastic ferocity.

They didn’t have to wait long for the door to open. Claude was mid-knock when it swung open, but there was no long-haired man waiting on the other side as Sylvain had been expecting. Instead, a tall, pale man with dark hair artfully grown to cover one eye, and a frown to rival Felix’s, glared at them from the doorway.

“Woah, who let you out of the crypt?” Sylvain said, taking in the equally as dark, floor length coat and pointed toe boots.

Claude had managed to keep a straight face despite everything Sylvain had said thus far, but when he registered what he was seeing, and connected Sylvain’s observation, he couldn’t contain his laughter, and it spilled out in an inelegant snort-slash-spit combo that he was forced to cover with a hand.

The man did not find it amusing, but he did smile. If Sylvain could even call the small sneer upon his face a smile.

“You must be the gentlemen responsible for the harassment of Miss. Macneary,” the man said.

Back at home in Fhirdiad, Sylvain had been sharing an apartment with a spider; too lazy and too attached to the thing to kill it or throw it out. The man before him sounded exactly how he imagined the spider would, should it ever somehow discover the wonder of human speech.

“If by harassing, you mean sharing our brilliance with, then we’re definitely guilty as charged!” Claude beamed, undeterred.

The man’s sneer widened in to a terrifying grin, and his eyes narrowed as though observing his unsuspecting prey. “Ah, yes, of course, how foolish of me. That’s _exactly_ how I recall her phrasing it.”

“Yeah, hate to be rude, bro, but are you gonna let us in or not? We kinda have an appointment with Mr. Aegir.” Sylvain said, shaking the book treatment – newly decorated with burger sauce stains – for emphasis. Sylvain also tried to catch a glimpse of Mr. Aegir from around the man's body, but the effort was fruitless, and Sylvain sank back on his heels. “I’m sure he’s eager to see us.”

“Oh yes, I’m certain he’s quivering in anticipation of the mere _thought _of your meeting.”

Sylvain grimaced at the imagery, and then conveniently remembered Claude’s words to be as irritating as possible. That also extended to whoever this guy was too, right? “Gross, man, do you have to speak like that?”

His creepy smile faltered, thin eyebrows pulling downwards in to a frown. “Like what, exactly?”

“Like Count Dracula’s dramatic cousin.”

“I do not sound—”

“Hubert,” came a distant voice, presumably Mr. Aegir’s, from inside the room. “Is that my next appointment? Show them in, if you would.”

“Oh god, your name is _Hubert?” _Claude said, eyes suddenly wide with incredulity. With a bowed head, he took a step back, and then said much more seriously, “Shit, we’re so sorry.”

“Ha. I see your brains have finally caught up with your mouths enough for you to remember your manners,” Hubert said, tilting his head back and looking down upon the both of them in an intimidating display.

“Yeah, dude. I mean, it can’t be easy living as a vampire with a name like Hubert,” Claude said. “Every day must be so hard. And we’re all about supporting those with important struggles or whatever.”

“That’s right,” Sylvain added. “Just last week, our friend Kyle got his yacht taken away by his parents because he got caught doing something ‘illegal’. But it's all good - I let him borrow one of my old ones, because I’m so charitable.”

Hubert straightened from his lean against the office door and crossed his arms over his chest in a way that made Sylvain think he could have done well for himself as a movie villain, should he ever wish to pursue an acting career. “I fear as though I might be rapidly losing intelligence the longer I remain conversing with you,” he said with a bitter twist of his lips.

“Then I suppose it might benefit thou to hand us over to Master Aegir,” Claude said with a thick, noble inflection.

“He’s very busy today. I’m sure you can understand why I am hesitant to do so.”

Claude hummed. “No, not really. Not unless you’re trying to boycott our book because you’re jealous or something.” He turned to Sylvain and continued in an exaggerated whisper, “Hey, that’d actually make a great plotline for the movie they’ll make about us once we blow up, bro.”

“Hell yeah. We could call it: ‘Vampires vs The Sex Machines”.

“I concede,” Hubert sighed. “I physically cannot stand to be in your presence a moment longer. I see now that there simply is no use in attempting to talking sense in to two men of such incredibly lacking comprehension. I shall take my leave.”

“Cool, nice talking to you Hubert,” Sylvain smiled as Hubert brushed past them. “Hey, quick question before you go though,” he called after his quickly retreating black coat. “Do you do kids parties? My nephew’s really in to all that horror stuff, and would love to meet a real life vampire!”

When Hubert declined to answer and disappeared at the end of the corridor, Sylvain shrugged and turned to Claude who was watching him with a mirthful eye.

“You’re on your own if Count Hubert calls the wrath of his entire coven upon you,” he snickered.

“I don’t think anyone would wish that kind of ordeal upon another person,” Sylvain grinned. “No matter how nefarious-looking.”

“_You got that damn right,”_ Lysithea breached Claude’s ‘no talking’ rule to snap. “_Carry on at this rate, and I’ll be able to publish a novel of my own, containing all of the dumb things you’ve said in the last seven hours.”_

Ignoring Lysithea’s dissent, Brett and Cody pushed the door open and entered the boss’ lair. Ferdinand’s office was so large that Petra’s office could probably have fit snugly inside, something that Sylvain would never have thought possible with how large Petra’s already was. What one man needed all that room for, Sylvain wasn’t sure, but it certainly made him feel uncomfortable to have so much empty space staring at his back. That and the alarming number of horse portraits decorating the walls.

“You must be Mr. Boss Man,” Claude said upon their entrance.

The man behind the desk looked up, flicking a section of his long, orange hair over his shoulder like a model from a shampoo ad. At first glance, he looked relatively harmless. Put-together and rational, even. That was up until he spoke.

“Yes,” Ferdinand said loudly, voice thunderous and brash, “I am Ferdinand Aegir.”

“Thanks for taking the time to see us,” Claude said. “I’m Cody, and this is my—”

“I know very well who the _both_ of you are,” Ferdinand said curtly. For a terrifying moment, Sylvain thought he was about to blow their cover by professing loudly for the entire building to hear, ‘You’re Mr. Riegan! The famous retrieval artist!’ but instead, Mr. Aegir just stood and pointed an accusatory finger at the space between them, “You’re the pair of imbeciles forcing my staff to read nonsensical _filth._”

It seemed as though Ferdinand wasn’t going to waste time bothering with pleasantries on this matter. His veneer of calm shattered, and underneath Sylvain could tell he was stressed. This meeting was probably the wrong flavour of icing on an extremely overbaked cake. It certainly wouldn’t take long to get the information they needed – that was if there was any information to get at all.

“Filth is a strong word,” Sylvain said, taking a seat in front of Ferdinand’s desk. “What we’ve written is purely a work of art, nothing more.”

“Oh really?” Ferdinand followed suit and took his own seat, folding his hands over one another. “If your intentions are pure and just, would you care to indulge me? What is the name of your manuscript?”

It felt more like being reprimanded by a teacher, talking to Ferdinand, than sitting through what was technically a job interview. And as Sylvain stared down at the paper in his hands, he realised that the title really was a lot harder to say out loud when somebody was not only forcing you to, but also heavily judging the words about to come out of your mouth. Still, Sylvain hadn’t come all of this way to feel embarrassed now.

“‘The Fuck-it List,’” he said proudly.

“The—” Ferdinand sputtered. “The _what?_”

“‘The Fuck-it List’, bro,” Claude echoed. “It’s a play on words. Creative, right?”

“No!” Ferdinand sounded physically pained, and looked just as affronted. “It’s abhorrent!”

“Wow, Petra really wasn’t lying when she said you were a virgin, huh.” Sylvain said, to which Ferdinand responded with a choked noise of disgust. “Here, this’ll change your mind, might even give it a much needed blowing, if you know what I mean,” Sylvain winked, handing over the treatment. “Just give it a read. We didn’t come all this way to go home empty handed.”

Ferdinand stared at the paper being pushed across his desk and physically recoiled away from it. “I’m not reading a single word that _either_ of you heathens have written,” he said, dramatically pushing it back with the tip of one of his fingers. “Miss. Macneary’s verdict was that she felt your manuscript did not fit alongside the high standards produced here at Aegir Publishing. Her verdict is final, and will be respected.”

“But you haven’t even read it,” Sylvain said flipping one of the pages over to reveal the first few paragraphs and tapping the words. “Miss. Macneary was clearly biased against us because we’re two devilishly handsome young men looking to make it big.”

Ferdinand didn’t seem very good at keeping his emotions in check; his outrage was palpable. ‘_All the more reason to keep pressing,’_ he could almost hear Claude saying.

“Miss. Macneary is our most talented, and most successful editor,” he said with an inflated chest, pointedly ignoring Sylvain’s attempt to draw his attention to their work. “She’s handpicked over seventy-five best sellers, and overseen the publication of hundreds of other wildly successful novels. None of which, have ever relied on that kind of—that kind of _smut!”_

“I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it again,” Claude said with a sad shake of his head. “I'll shout it from the rooftops if I have to. Everyone deserves to jack off. Even you, Mr. Aegir, but _especially_ your readers. We can be that extra hand they need.”

“This kind of behaviour is inadmissible,” Ferdinand said flatly. “I accepted this appointment because I’d hoped to obtain a written apology for Miss. Macneary, and to see you off amicably. However I can see that clearly will not be the case.”

“We’re not leaving until you read our treatment and tell us it’s good,” Sylvain said, sitting back in his chair and crossing his arms over his chest. “We have all day. So get reading, Boss Man.”

Ferdinand scowled, another exaggerated gesture. Sylvain wondered if Ferdinand knew he was as easy to read as the books he published. “I absolutely will do nothing of the sort,” he said. But then his eyes widened in comical horror as his gaze fell upon a few of the words written before him. “Dear _goddess_,” he whispered. “Your opening—your opening paragraph begins with incredibly graphic fellatio!”

“That it does! Sounds great, right? Sally’s really talented! Spoiler alert, she can actually tip Brian over the edge in a little under ten seconds by the end of the book—”

“Enough! You cannot talk so flippantly about the sanctity of love making! This publishing company prides itself on novels of purity and grace, created by and for all audiences. I cannot think of a single demographic that might find this kind of _impure slop_ digestible, let alone _enjoyable_!”

Claude tried to interject, but Ferdinand held up a hand and continued his loud declaration. “I think I’ve seen enough, gentlemen. There might be other publishing companies willing to take this kind of… work, forward, but that will _not _be us, and if you won’t be submitting an apology to Miss. Macneary, then I suggest you leave the premises immediately.”

“And who’s going to make us?” Sylvain asked. An innocently foolish question when asked to a company with a considerable security force behind it. To Aegir Publishing, it was a challenge.

“I’ll call—”

“Who are you gonna call?” Claude raised an eyebrow. Sylvain whispered _Ghostbusters._ “Count Hubert? Edelgard Hresvelg? _Security?_”

“How do you know—what are you _talking_ about? Where did you hear that? I mean-- Mrs. Hresvelg certainly has nothing to do with this! It was _my_ decision to relocate staff and I refuse to be questioned any further on the subject!”

If there was ever a doubt that Ferdinand knew something before, that blunder had certainly just confirmed it. For a man of so many words, he was, very suddenly without – a tell-tale sign of suspicious involvement if ever there was one. If the reasoning behind the relocation of staff was a normal occurrence, surely he wouldn’t have to defend the decision so vehemently.

“Uh, dude, what subject?” Claude asked. It wasn’t a probe for further intel, rather confirmation and reassurance that they were, in fact, clueless civilians. Anything less would have drawn suspicion back unto themselves. Claude certainly was a fast thinker.

Ferdinand stopped, and finally seemed to remember that he was conversing with what appeared to be two incredibly annoying, and oblivious young men, rather than one-and-a-half retrieval artists. He collected himself, straightened his already immaculate tie, and then cleared his throat. “There is no subject,” he snapped, and then his voice turned quiet. “How about you gentlemen forget I even said anything at all? In exchange for your discretion, I can refer you to a friend of mine who might be more interested in what you have to offer.”

The abrupt change of attitude would have been amusing had Sylvain been at liberty to laugh. As it stood, he settled for a polite smile to mirror Claude’s. He wasn’t sure whether or not to be happy, or whether the excitement he was feeling was warranted – was this information helpful? Sylvain couldn’t even tell.

“That would be fantastic,” Claude said. “Tell you what, we’ll do one better and forget this entire meeting happened at all, even the parts where you called our work ‘impure slop’. We’ll keep you out of our origin story when we blow up to protect you from our hard-core fanbase.”

Ferdinand’s damage-control-smile was tight and clearly fuelled by regret. “Then we have a deal, gentlemen. I’ll get you his number and then you can be on your way.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

\--LEONIE—

It had been a long time since Claude and Sylvain had entered the building, right? But Leonie hadn’t really been keeping track of the time. Sonia had been keeping her busy with talk of her newest novel, and while Leonie wasn’t a huge fan of literature, she _was_ starting to think she might be a fan of Sonia, and so she’d let the hours slip by without even noticing.

Lysithea had checked in a while ago; she’d said something about another meeting in a couple of hours’ time. Leonie hadn’t really been listening, opting instead for turning her earpiece off altogether. It was nothing short of distracting to have the constant background buzz of the hotel, or threat of Lysithea snapping at her in her ear when she was trying to flirt with one of the most attractive women she’d ever seen.

Besides, it wasn’t as though they really _needed_ her to do anything other than stage a riot once everything was said and done. Child’s play, really. Claude and Sylvain didn’t even need to be there for it.

Sonia had left a while ago, had given Leonie her number and said with a smile: “Call me some time, I’d love to hear your thoughts on an upcoming project I have in the works.”

Leonie called that a date.

It was when she was sitting back in the chair she’d started in that she decided to switch her earpiece back on; a spur-of-the-moment decision once sitting in silence had become too boring. What she did not expect to hear when the line buzzed back to life, was Claude screaming her name frantically and desperately.

“_Leonie! Leonie! Pick up! Leonie!”_

“What?_”_ she whispered in to the mic. “I’m here, what’s wrong?”

“_Ugh, finally! He’s been doing that non-stop for the last twelve minutes in the hopes you’d pick up,” _Lorenz groaned. “_I’m seriously starting to regret not pursuing another career path.”_

“_Leonie, we need you to—_”

“Say no more, boss. I know what needs to be done.”

“_No, Leonie you don’t have—”_

Leonie turned off the earpiece again, and then slipped out of her horrifically tight blazer. She didn’t need either for what she was about to do.

Her eyes scanned the crowd in search for someone who already looked agitated enough to resort to violence should someone rub them the wrong way. She didn’t have to look for long. There was a man, around her age, with dark hair and a twitching frown being turned away by the front desk. He shouted something about their treatment of him being ‘unfair’ and then walked away, slamming his briefcase down on to the floor as he took up post by the automatic doors, and began fiddling with something on his mobile phone.

Leonie made a beeline for him, enjoying the accompanying sound of Hilda’s heels against the tiled floor as she closed the distance.

“Hey, watch where you’re going, woman,” the man snapped when Leonie bumped his shoulder a little harder than what was probably necessary.

“What’s your problem? It was an accident.”

“See, I don’t think it was!” he shouted. “I think you assaulted me on purpose, just like everyone else seems intent on doing today!”

“Woah, man,” Leonie laughed, and watched his face grow more infuriated by the second. “Calm down, I really don’t think you’re that special in the eyes of the Universe.”

“Tch,” he spat, looking her up and down. “What would you know? Stupid bitch.”

Leonie thought that if ever there was an indicator that she should resort to violence. That was it. At least this guy had done _something_ right today – he’d made Leonie’s job a whole lot easier.

When her fist connected with his face, she took great joy in watching him tumble to the ground in a heap of grey fabric. The man cried out, hand flying to his cheek to cradle the damage Leonie had inflicted, and almost simultaneously, the people nearest them gasped and shouted in varying degrees of alarm. One brave soul tried to grab Leonie’s arm to pull her back and away from the injured man still wailing on the ground, but she threw them off, determined not to cause more of a ruckus than what was necessary by getting extras involved.

Someone shouted for a receptionist to call for help, and Leonie grinned.

Perfect.

Security would be on their way any second to escort them both out. All she had to do was keep this level of inconvenience up, and Claude would be praising her for a job well done.

“You fucking bitch!” The man pulled himself back to his feet and immediately attempted to swing a lazy fist in Leonie’s direction. She dodged easily, stepping to the side to watch him stumble over himself and fall in to the arms of an innocent bystander.

“Hey! Get off,” the innocent bystander said, pushing the man back in Leonie’s direction. He bumped in to her, still awkward on his feet after the dazing punch to the jaw. Leonie offered him no respite. She pushed him away again, but he didn’t fall a second time. Instead, he tried another desperately clumsy hook that caught Leonie’s arm. It definitely wasn’t the most painful attack she’d ever endured, but the thump still made her skin tingle and sting beneath the fabric of her shirt.

He seemed satisfied with the minimal damage he’d inflicted, and gained some semblance of confidence as he readied himself for another attempt. Had she not been holding back, Leonie would have taken great pleasure in rendering him unconscious in less than a second, but she couldn’t take it that far, so instead, she sent a swift kick to his shin, watched him double over, and then brought an elbow down upon his exposed back.

The police stormed in to the building before she could revel in the wheezing sounds he was making upon the floor. Two officers grabbed her arms and forced her hands in to cuffs, and it was only then that she realised security hadn’t come at all. Someone had instead called the local police force. That definitely had not been the plan.

Claude hated it when Leonie got arrested. Leonie wasn’t particularly fond of the experience either.

“Shit,” she said out loud.

“Shit indeed,” the officer keeping her detained echoed. “I think you’d better quietly get in to the car, miss. We don’t want this to become difficult.”

“Yeah, sure,” she sighed. There was no use in dragging the show on any longer.

One officer escorted her outside while the other worked on detaining the man she’d supposedly ‘assaulted completely unprompted’. The moment fresh air hit her skin, and she stepped beyond the doors of the wretched Aegir building, she made eye contact with a very confused, very exasperated looking Byleth.

“_Sandra?_” they blanched, using Leonie’s undercover name – the same one on her ID card. “What happened?”

“You know this woman?” the officer asked.

“Uh, yeah, she’s my friend?” Byleth said, more a question than an affirmative statement.

The officer didn’t seem to care. “She’s being arrested for assault. If you wouldn’t mind, I think you’d better come with us too.”

Byleth nodded, and then joined Leonie in the back of the police car.

When the officer went back inside to help his partner, Leonie shuffled closer to Byleth and whispered in their ear, “Why are you here?”

“I was sent to retrieve you,” Byleth said with something like a smile. “Claude was trying to tell you that the plan was off, but then you cut the line and went in all guns blazing.”

“Oh,” Leonie said. “Uh, oops?”

Byleth laughed and then touched their ear with a wince. Up close, Leonie could hear the unmistakable distant buzzing of people shouting through Byleth’s earpiece. “I don’t think you should turn on your earpiece for a little while.”

Leonie struggled against her restraints. “I couldn’t. Even if I wanted to.”

Already, she could imagine the pandemonium: Lorenz complaining about Leonie’s brash methods; Claude complaining about her inability to wait, or listen; Felix complaining about something nobody cared about.

“Oh yeah,” Byleth said. “Also, Claude told me to tell you that bail is coming out of your pay.”

“Aw shit,” Leonie grumbled. “Can it come out of next pay? I promised Sonia I’d treat her to a really expensive meal tonight.”

Byleth paused, presumably waiting for the answer.

“Claude said no.”

Leonie slumped back in the seat. “Yeah,” she sighed, “that’s fair.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry this took a little while! i had a hard time making words come out of my brain!!  
thank you all so much for reading and sticking with this lmao your comments and kudos make my day!!!  
i hope everyone has a merry christmas, happy holidays, and a great new year!!  
also if i now have a tumblr if youd like to join me there, its the same as my twitter handle @ berriesmangoes


	9. THE AEGIR BUILDING - PART THREE

CHAPTER NINE: LORENZ

THE AEGIR BUILDING – PART THREE

“I said I was sorry like a—”

“—Like a billion times. Yes, Leonie, you did mention the fact,” Lorenz drawled. “Dare I say, a _billion_ times?”

It had been twenty minutes since the recon team had returned from their mission, and Leonie was _still_ grovelling for forgiveness – as was the routine, once every job. Few things were able to surprise Lorenz after spending so many years with this strange group of individuals he’d come to call family; he’d even come to _expect_ the shocking turns of events that would inevitably arise from Claude’s closely guarded secret plans. Over time, Lorenz had learned to adapt to Claude’s unpredictability and even started to enjoy and admire his foolhardy schemes beneath all of his own complaining upon being left out of the loop.

Still, for how acclimatised he was to his friends’ behaviour, it had become no less irritating to deal with them. That was a fact that would remain steadfast, likely until the end of time.

“But, I mean, if I’m totally honest, you could have made it a little clearer that you wanted me to stand down,” Leonie mounted her flimsy defence with her hands raised in mock surrender and a hopeful spark glittering in her eye.

It was a fruitless endeavour - all of her hope soon diminished when Claude’s first response was to snort in the most undignified manner.

“Yeah, maybe I could have,” he began, kicking the god-awful sneakers off of his feet and propping them up on to the coffee table with an exhausted sigh. “If you had actually let me get a word in.”

“I did let you!” Leonie tried. “You made it sound like I needed to act fast.”

Claude looked to Lysithea with a raised eyebrow and Lysithea nodded knowingly, pressing a button on one of her many laptops to play back the audio of Claude’s attempt to contact Leonie from earlier in the day. It was quite amusing to hear it back, and even more so to witness the mortification upon Leonie’s face at hearing her own voice being played back to her.

“_Leonie, we need you to—”_

_“Say no more, boss. I know what needs to be done.”_

“_No, Leonie you don’t have—”_

With a triumphant smile, Claude turned back around. “I know it might be quite difficult to spot, but do you hear the problem there, Leonie?”

Leonie sucked in a breath, protests dying at the tip of her tongue. “Yes, Claude,” she mumbled with the defeated pout of a reprimanded child. “I hear the problem.”

“Well, it doesn’t matter anymore,” he said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “What’s done is done, and I guess if anything, we cemented what we already knew. If Lorenz and Felix run in to any trouble tonight, I think it’s safe to assume we’ll be receiving another visit from the Adrestian Police Force rather than Mr. Aegir armed with a stern warning. They arrived on the scene in record time, which leads me to believe that the Hresvelg Empire might actually hold some power over the local law enforcement.”

Leonie perked up ever so slightly at that, deeming it suitable justification for her actions. No doubt she’d claim it was her intention all along when the other half of the team inevitably questioned their trip to Aegir’s closest police station.

Lorenz saved the rolling of his eyes for a later date – there was something more pressing in Claude’s statement that needed addressing. “It’s safe to say that Lorenz will run in to _no _trouble whatsoever,” Lorenz amended, a click of his tongue echoing his disdain for Claude’s obvious, and ill-timed attempt at teasing.

“What about me?” Felix asked, the crease between his brows that seemed to be a permanent fixture upon his face pronouncing itself even further. _Seriously_, Lorenz scoffed internally. And he thought Lysithea had an attitude problem.

“What about you? The police can have you for all I care. It’ll certainly alleviate my headache.”

“I think enough arrests have been made for one day,” Claude laughed and then his expression turned dark. “Besides, we have more pressing matters to attend to – there’s someone we have to… dispose of before we can continue.”

Sylvain and Felix, predictably, whipped their heads around in Claude’s direction. Upon witnessing Claude’s entirely serious expression, Sylvain’s eyes widened a fraction, like he’d just endured a completely unprecedented betrayal - as though Claude was no longer the man he'd just spent the morning alongside. Felix’s frown somehow managed to deepen.

It took a lot of willpower on Lorenz’s part to suppress the sigh that desperately tried to escape his lips. For all of the insistence Claude had placed on minimising theatrics, he surely was getting his money’s worth out of the acting course he’d forced them all on two years ago.

“Hey now, I didn’t think we were in the business of killing people,” Sylvain laughed nervously. Really, Lorenz had thought him less gullible than that, but maybe he’d given both of Dimitri’s grunts a little too much credit.

Claude shrugged. “I’m afraid this is inevitable,” he said simply, rolling up the sleeves of his shirt. Lorenz was going to have to have a word with him about the sheer amount of trashy novels he’d been consuming as of late. It really was manifesting itself in the most embarrassing of ways. “We’re compromised. Our whole cover could be reduced to ashen tatters unless we take them out. I’m sure you understand.”

“No, I don’t understand,” Felix snapped, voice harsh and unrelenting as he pushed himself in front of Sylvain to challenge Claude. Oh how fun it would have been to watch that particular fight ensue. If only they had the time to drag this on for another few hours. “We didn’t sign up for murder.”

“Too late,” Claude grinned. “Leonie, bring me the suspect and a pair of scissors.”

Leonie gasped. “Please, Claude, anything but that! I said I was sorry. You don’t have to do this. You don’t have to hurt her!”

Claude said nothing, just held out his hand in a gesture of expectation. Leonie’s gaze dropped to the floor in reluctant acceptance – there was no acting necessary on her part, but Lorenz hadn’t the energy to feel sorry for her. She’d brought this ample punishment upon herself for acting so rashly.

In a burst of movement, Leonie got to her feet to follow orders at the same time that Felix moved to stop her, as though they’d somehow managed to sneak a hostage inside the hotel room without Felix knowing about it and he was about to act the hero and stop the whole thing from proceeding. That boy really did seem to have a problem with throwing himself head-first at conclusions without so much as a fleeting thought for a statement’s integrity. At least it provided Lorenz with some entertainment before the night inevitably gave way to quiet caution.

Before Felix could get very far, Lorenz threw out his own arm to stop him. The satisfied grin it earned him from Claude for keeping up the charade was definitely worth being called a ‘murderous purple bastard’. Still, Lorenz was painfully aware that Felix could very easily push his way past, but he seemed instead to stop upon Lorenz’s insistence.

“How can you let this happen?” Felix snapped up at him.

Lorenz simply raised an eyebrow in response, and turned to watch as Leonie returned with scissors – from where, Lorenz had no earthly clue. Both Felix and Sylvain looked puzzled when they noticed that sans the scissors, she remained empty handed. They’d probably expected her to be hauling in some kind of terrified hostage, struggling against rope ties with their mouth duct taped shut. It was only when Leonie spoke again that they realised how foolish they’d been.

“Sandra’s a nice woman, Claude. She’s going on a date tonight, you really don’t have to murder her,” Leonie said, reaching in to her back pocket to retrieve her ID card. “Think of Sonia, Claude, she’s going to be waiting all night in that restaurant, wondering where her really sexy date went, wondering if she’s been stood up.”

“Too bad,” Claude said, hand motioning again for the scissors. “I can give you five minutes to cancel, but Sandra has to die. Now.”

“Let’s not be too hasty, boss,” Leonie tried again and clutched the ID close to her chest. “Can’t we just let Sandra remain a bit of a wild card for now? You let Monica get by on way more serious charges than petty assault.”

_Ah, Monica,_ Lorenz thought. One of Leonie’s better, and more useful pseudonyms. The very one that had sacrificed herself in order to complete the Acheron job.

“Monica was a good woman,” Lorenz said solemnly. “Sandra will _never_ be Monica.”

“Who the fuck is Sandra?” Felix said, relaxing his posture with a frown; he certainly looked relieved to note that no actual murdering would be taking place. Metaphorical murder, Lorenz supposed, was permitted.

“Leonie’s cover name,” Lysithea explained under her breath, and then said loudly for Claude to hear: “This is her ninth one this year.”

“This year?” Sylvain asked. “But it’s only June.”

Claude nodded. “Which is precisely why Sandra needs to die. We can’t let Sandra get arrested here again – if something goes wrong, it won’t be as easy to get her out a second time. We don’t have the connections in Adrestia that we do in Leicester.”

“You have connections in the police?” Felix asked.

“I _might_ have a friend that extends a helpful hand toward me and my family from time to time, should we ever find ourselves in the hands of the authorities,” Claude said quickly. “But that’s not important. Adrestia isn’t home, and we’ll be drawing too much attention to ourselves if we allow Sandra to be charged again. We’ll effectively be playing chess with one piece less than the Flame Emperor if we let Sandra live.”

Leonie sat back down with a pained groan, holding out the ID card for Claude to take. They wrestled over it for a few childish seconds before she eventually, albeit reluctantly, relinquished it. “I think it’ll be for the best if I don’t talk to Sonia. Just do what you have to do,” she said, burying her face in to the crook of her elbow.

“Are you sure?” he asked, removing his feet from the table to cross one leg over the other with the confidence of a pompous king. “I will permit you to say your final goodbyes.”

Her voice was muffled when she spoke, disguising her disappointment behind the sleeve of her shirt. “Don’t make this more painful than it needs to be, Riegan.”

Claude shrugged. “If you say so,” he said, and then snipped the ID card in half with a precise _snap_.

The once dangerously silent edge to the room quickly dissipated after the two halves of Sandra’s identity fell to the floor. Lorenz could feel it in the way that Sylvain and Felix no longer appeared though they might start carving their way through the hotel room to save non-existent hostages with the brute force of action movie protagonists.

“_Oh _Ignatz is gonna be so pissed that he has to make another card so soon,” Lysithea said with that wicked grin of hers. “Can I tell him?”

“I thought he wasn’t answering you?” Lorenz said, recalling Lysithea’s tantrum after being hung up on.

“He’ll answer me when I tear the hotel door off of its hinges.”

“Nobody is damaging hotel property. We’ve already thrown enough money away for today,” Claude said with a pointed look in Leonie’s direction. Leonie just groaned again in response.

“So, now that we’ve established that we won’t be complicit in a murder,” Sylvain said, finally finding his voice after that whole dramatic display. “Can I go and take a shower?”

“Ugh, please,” Felix groaned. “I can’t stand to look at you when you’re still dressed like that.”

Sylvain hummed. “Well we can’t have that, can we?”

“Yeah, whatever,” Claude waved them off. “We have four hours until phase two begins, get all the rest you can.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

Lorenz found Claude out in the hotel garden over an hour later. Everybody else had opted for squeezing in some nap time before departure, but neither Claude nor Lorenz had ever been ones for napping – Lorenz never did operate at his best after being shaken awake by the unforgiving shrillness of his alarm, and he needed to be at his most alert if he was going to get not only himself in and out of the Aegir building unscathed, but a bratty novice too. Claude didn’t like to waste time sleeping either, but Lorenz couldn’t pretend to ever know what exactly was going on inside his brain at any given time, only that it worked non-stop.

“I thought I might find you here,” Lorenz said as he approached. Claude was sitting on a garden bench perched near the tranquil backdrop of a water feature, with a laptop settled on his knee, and a cup of coffee perched on the wooden arm. He still hadn’t bothered to change out of his awful attire either, though he had forgone the blazer and tie.

Upon hearing Lorenz’s voice, Claude looked up from the dim light of his screen and offered Lorenz a smile. He looked tired, but then Lorenz couldn’t blame him after the morning’s events. He probably hadn’t slept much the night before, if Lorenz’s guess of him staying up to cement their plans was accurate. “Oh, did you?”

“No. Not at all,” Lorenz admitted with a smile of his own. “This was the last place I thought to check before giving up entirely and resigning myself to another hour of listening to Leonie snore.”

Claude laughed quietly, closed the lid of his laptop, and then patted the empty space next to him in an invitation for Lorenz to sit. Lorenz complied, wondering why Claude had chosen to sit out here on such an uncomfortable piece of garden furniture for so long when a perfectly expensive hotel room was at his disposal.

“Are you ready for tonight?” he asked with just the slightest hint of amusement to his voice.

“Really, Claude. Need you even ask?”

“I’ll take that as a yes,” he said, draining the last of his coffee. “Is Felix?”

“As ready as he’ll ever be, I suppose,” Lorenz sighed, and stared out across the quiet garden. Despite it being almost ten, the garden was still lit with a calm ambiance, the only sounds travelling across the expertly kept greenery being the quiet trickling of the water feature behind them. “Really, I cannot fathom the reasoning behind sending him in. If this all goes wrong on his account, I don’t think even _I _will find it satisfactory to say ‘I told you so’.”

“Oh I’m sure you will,” Claude smirked. “Besides, I need two people on this mission, and as much as I would love to have two of _you_, I don’t think Linhardt’s quite finished with his cloning machine.”

“Flattery will get you nowhere,” Lorenz clicked his tongue despite the proud inflation of his chest. “I still think it’s a risky idea to send baby on his first mission with stakes as high as these.”

“Hey, Sylvain did just fine, didn’t he?”

“Sylvain’s only job was to be insufferable. I don’t suppose that was much of a stretch for him.”

Claude hummed; a small sound that meant he had considered Lorenz’s concern, but had ultimately chosen to dismiss it. It didn’t irk Lorenz as much as it had done once, but it still pulled a sigh from his lips. “I just hope you know what you’re doing. I can already tell that you’re working on some kind of grand scheme.”

“I _was_,” Claude amended, and Lorenz studied him for a moment, watched the slight pinch of his brows as he mentally encountered some kind of road block in his plan. “There’s something that’s bothering me.”

Lorenz raised an eyebrow at the rare confession. It wasn’t very often that Claude ever admitted to being uncertain about something, but whenever he did, Lorenz usually found himself acting as a navigational guide of sorts for Claude’s brain. Together, they’d always muddle through whatever it was that Claude deemed out of reach, and find the conclusion waiting on the other side. Or rather, Claude would smile that smug little smile of his and mark the case solved while Lorenz just waited for it all to become clear in due time.

_Well_, Lorenz decided, _better get to work. _“Care to elaborate?”

Claude leaned back on the bench, somehow managing to make himself comfortable upon its unforgiving wooden slats. “I would if I knew how,” he sighed. “But I can’t quite put a finger on it. It feels as though I’m missing something. Something big.”

“Something is stumping the Mastermind Tactician? Now that certainly _is_ interesting.”

“Very funny Lorenz,” Claude smiled, and then turned thoughtful once again. “Have you noticed anything off about this case?”

“Other than being forced to work with two bumbling idiots? No, I can’t really pinpoint anything extraordinary. We’ve dealt with significantly more complex puzzles than this. It’s a simple matter of retrieve the information, retrieve the locket.”

“That’s what I thought initially,” Claude hummed, swivelling around and pulling his feet up on to the bench in an attempt to rest them in Lorenz’s lap.

“Not in a million years,” Lorenz warned, pushing his feet back down.

“That’s what I thought too,” Claude laughed and settled for leaning forwards instead. Restless, Lorenz noted. Something really was bugging him. “It feels as though things might be going too smoothly.”

“What, you _want_ a repeat of the Acheron case?”

“God _no. _I just mean that I’d expected more of a fight from someone who would masquerade under a name like The Flame Emperor, is all. A few traps, some puzzles, I don’t know, a big, fuck-off guard whose only words are ‘No entry permitted beyond this point’.”

It was Lorenz’s turn to hum. He supposed there was some truth to that, though Claude, as ever, liked to indulge in his over dramatics. “Perhaps we simply haven’t gotten close enough to the treasure,” Lorenz suggested. “I’ll bet that we won’t find anything of the sort until we at least reach the Hresvelg building. This is mere exposition.”

“I suppose,” Claude mumbled. “I still feel like there’s something I should have worked out already.”

Lorenz couldn’t deny that there _had_ been something ‘off’ about the case from the moment Claude had returned from the Blaidydd building, but he’d learned not to bludgeon on with baseless assumptions pretty early in his retrieval career. Still, the lessons he’d learned in restraint hadn’t dulled his instincts any. Claude was definitely on to something, but he wouldn’t gain any clarity if he narrowed his focus too much.

“We’ve only just begun the jigsaw puzzle and already you’re trying to predict what the final image will be,” Lorenz scoffed. “Try again once you have a few more pieces in place, Claude. Let the infiltration teams do their jobs.”

Claude sighed. Unlike the previous sighs, it was one of relief, rather than distress, and Lorenz felt himself weighing a little less too. “You’re right,” he said, sitting straight again. 

“Of course I’m right,” Lorenz said.

Claude turned to face him, his smile roguish and charming – in Lorenz’s opinion, the best of his smiles. “Have I ever told you you’re my favourite?”

“I already told you that nonsensical flattery does not work on me, Riegan,” Lorenz said, despite the stuttering of his heart. “You ought to know that by now.”

“It was worth a shot,” he said, picking up his laptop and empty coffee cup and getting to his feet. “Come on, we’d best head back inside before they start thinking we’re doing something scandalous.”

“Perish the thought,” Lorenz drawled.

They only made it a few steps away from the bench before Claude suddenly stopped. “Oh, wait,” he said, holding out his laptop for Lorenz to hold in favour of rummaging around in his pockets. “I almost forgot, I wanted to give you something before you left tonight.”

Lorenz raised an eyebrow. A gift from Claude was a rare occurrence, but not an unwelcome one. What he could possibly have that had to wait until such a late hour was intriguing in itself.

The laptop was soon exchanged for whatever Claude had retrieved from his back pocket. Which Lorenz discovered was a small cylindrical tube made of black plastic, bearing the label ‘For Lorenz,’ and adorned with copious amounts of obnoxious heart stickers and vulgar-looking emojis. “I made these before we left for Adrestia. You never know when you might need them.”

Lorenz rolled the gift around in the palm of his hand, and listened to the tell-tale sound of something medicinal loosely rattling around inside. “Dare I ask what this concoction is?”

“Laxatives,” Claude grinned. “I made them myself – they’re four times as effective as regular ones.”

“_Laxatives? _What on _earth_ would I need laxatives for?”

“I’m sure the need will crop up somewhere.”

Despite his best attempts, Lorenz could not stop disgust from making itself apparent upon his features. “Oh yes,” he said. “I’m sure I’ll have plenty of need to relieve people’s clogged bowel movements on my extremely covert stealth mission through a building’s air ventilation system.”

“When you say it like that, it makes it seem like you don’t want them,” Claude said. “Maybe I’ll give them to Linhardt instead. He’ll probably appreciate them a whole lot more.”

“I didn’t say I didn’t want them,” Lorenz said quickly, closing his hand around the tube before Claude could snatch it away again. “But if you think this serves as an adequate birthday present, you are sorely mistaken.”

“Oh don’t worry about that. I already picked out your real present months ago.”

“I dread to think what monstrosity of a gift you’ve procured _this_ time,” Lorenz sighed. He still hadn’t gotten around to finding a place for the plastic children’s tea set that had replaced all of his _actual_ crockery last year. How Claude had managed to break in to his apartment and swap them was still a mystery, but then they weren’t retrieval artists in name alone. Really, it made Lorenz’s gift of an antique chess set for Claude’s previous birthday look almost ridiculous.

“Believe me, you’re gonna love this one.”

“I’m sure I will,” Lorenz said, unconvinced. “But I suppose we’d better get a move on and wake the children if we actually want to leave any time soon.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

\--FELIX—

Byleth drove the car like they were participating in a high speed chase around the city, and had Felix not gotten used to Sylvain’s reckless driving over the years, he might have looked as queasy as Lorenz. But, instead of keeping nausea at bay, Felix watched as the city flew by at an illegal pace, and in his mind’s eye, went over the plan for the tenth time that evening.

On the surface, the plan was simple. Lorenz had made it so with the excuse of not ‘overwhelming’ Felix, but a child could probably have followed through with it just fine. The only concern Felix had was with its unpredictability. All manners of things could go wrong, all sorts of unforeseen variables lied in waiting, and while Felix was confident in his ability to deal with any deviances in the plan with brute force, his confidence lacked severely when tackling any such surprises with discretion. Being a body guard for most of his life hadn’t exactly prepared him in the art of stealth, but he supposed the ridiculously tight and mercilessly uncomfortable outfit Lorenz had forced him in to would compensate for his heavy-handedness.

The black fabric encasing his body was so soft it was almost slippery – Lorenz had explained it would make their passage through the vents a lot easier, but Felix couldn’t even find a way to sit comfortably in the back seat of the car without sliding along the faux-leather seats. If not for the seatbelt, combined with Byleth’s perilous driving, he might have crashed through the back window and found himself decorating the streets of Aegir. Luckily, the rubber grips attached to his shoes and gloves allowed him to hold on long enough to see him arrive outside of the building in one piece.

_“Hey, Felix, do me a favour and stand in front of Lorenz,” _Sylvain said as they waited for Byleth to unload their equipment from the boot of the car. Under the assumption that something technical needed adjusting, Felix did as instructed, standing in view of Lorenz’s chest camera, and the additional, wireless micro-camera stuck just below his eye. It wasn’t until Sylvain continued with a sly, _“OK, now turn around,”_ that Felix realised what was happening and made a face.

“Fuck you,” he snapped despite the burning of his cheeks. “Insatiable pig.”

Sylvain ignored him with a light-hearted laugh. “_Spin for me, darling!”_

“You’re so lucky you’re back at the hotel. Or I’d strangle you with my bare hands.”

_“Yeah, sorry Fe, but that threat’s really not having the effect you want it to right now.” _

Felix clicked his tongue and turned to Lorenz. “How do I turn this shit off?” he asked, gesturing to the piece lodged in his ear. “It’s distracting me.”

“You can’t,” Lorenz said simply. “Those idiots are going to guide you through the vents so you don’t get lost.”

“I have an excellent sense of direction, I won’t get lost.”

“_No you don’t,” _Sylvain chided, and Felix could practically hear the stupid, smug smile in his voice. “_You still use the GPS to get to work.”_

Felix let out a calming breath. “What is it going to take to get you to shut the fuck up?”

“_My silence cannot be bought.”_

Byleth came to Felix’s rescue before he could vocalise his entirely serious request for the contact details of an assassin, despite how tasteless a joke it was considering their past. “That’s everything,” they said, gesturing towards the two rucksacks Lorenz had packed before leaving. One contained a laptop and headset for Byleth to remain on standby with a quick getaway – the other contained two tasers, the device Lorenz needed to download the security data, a drill to remove the vent grating, and two weird looking tools that had more functions than Felix was capable of remembering.

The building was a five minute walk from their parked destination, and Felix noted the sporadically lit windows indicating that there were still people milling about inside despite the late hour. It felt weird to know that in mere minutes they’d be inside, sneaking around like the thieves Felix had been trained to spot and combat for most of his life. Standing in the quiet of midnight, he couldn’t help but wonder if he had ever been obliviously walking around the Blaidydd building with the Flame Emperor hidden safely above his own head. It was then that he decided that the embarrassment of being outsmarted heavily outweighed all of his reservations about breaking the law – it was time to take several steps forward in their race towards the locket, no matter the cost.

“I’ll wait in the car,” Byleth said, tearing Felix away from his inner revelations. “Let me know when you’re close to leaving, I’ll bring it close around the back for you to jump right in.”

“Much appreciated, Byleth,” Lorenz said, shouldering one of the rucksacks. “I’ll provide you with an adequate warning, as always.”

Byleth nodded, and then slid back in to the car. Felix could just pick out the dim glow of a laptop being opened before Lorenz started towards the building without him. “Do keep up,” he said over his shoulder. “I certainly won’t shed a tear if you get left behind.”

“_Uh,_ _I kinda will,”_ Sylvain said. “_Felix pays for the Netflix subscription.” _

“When I get back I’m changing the password,” Felix grumbled. “You can find someone else to leech off.”

“_Yeah, do what you want, Fe. I have friends in high places now. Lysithea would totally help me hack my way back in, right?”_

_“No,”_ came the immediate reply.

_“See? Your threats are losing their edge. You’re gonna have to get more creative.”_

Felix tried his best to stomp after Lorenz, wholly dissatisfied with the way his specialised shoes made little to no sound against the tarmac to accompany his irritation. His work shoes, for how uncomfortable they were, at least made satisfactory amounts of noise whenever Felix needed to storm off. Which, when working for Dimitri and alongside Sylvain, was extremely often.

“Why don’t you go and wrangle a herd of wildebeest?” Lorenz stopped and turned on Felix again, a twitch of his eyebrow being the only tell that he was pissed off. “I’m sure even they could do a better job of keeping quiet than you.”

“Alright,” Felix snapped. “We’re not even close to the building yet.”

“_This is going to be so much fun,”_ Claude wheezed over the mic. “_Does anyone want snacks? I hear Hilda’s room has marshmallows.”_

Lorenz ignored the interruption with admirable restraint. “With how loudly you’re marching,” he said, eyes pointedly dropping to Felix’s shoes, “I’m sure Hilda’s infiltration team could hear you from Varley.”

Felix attempted to cross his arms over his chest, but the slippery material of his outfit made it almost impossible. He settled for balling his fists instead. “Yeah? Then I’ll bet they can also hear your annoying nagging. Stop badgering me and worry about yourself.”

“Claude, I can’t do this,” Lorenz said in to his mic. “Please confine him to the car and let me do my job.”

_“Just shut the fuck up and start moving before the sun rises and you’re both still standing there bickering,” _Lysithea snapped. “_I would actually like to sleep at some point tonight.”_

Felix stared at Lorenz, hoping that the frown he was wearing adequately conveyed his dislike for him and his ill faith in Felix’s abilities. But ultimately, he was forced to leave his more aggressive retorts unspoken – Lysithea was right. The longer they stayed arguing, the less time they allowed themselves to infiltrate safely. Lorenz seemed to arrive at the same conclusion, because he scoffed and turned on his heel without saying another word.

By the time they got to the building, Felix was buzzing with pent up energy. All day long he’d been forced, under Lorenz’s insistence, to sit and study the blueprints, only breaking from the task to practice shuffling around the hotel floor in preparation for the vents. He was itching to do something productive, especially after watching and listening to Sylvain succeed all day. If Dimitri called, which he definitely would, Felix wanted a solid defence in place to protect him from the inevitable questioning of his compliance with the team – he’d sooner die than give Dimitri another excuse to scold him for ‘hindering the progress of the case’.

“Stay here,” Lorenz said under his breath as they approached the back of the building. They’d stuck to the shadows, artfully dodging the line-of-sight of the outside security cameras on their way to where the vent entrance was positioned. Lorenz then rifled soundlessly through the rucksack and took out the drill, while Felix slipped his weird tool in to the conveniently specialised pocket sewn in to the sleeve of his outfit.

With way less sound than Felix thought possible for a power tool, Lorenz removed the vent grate and placed it nearby before gesturing to Felix. “After you,” he said.

As per the plan, Felix nodded and climbed inside. It was a tight fit – Felix wasn’t really sure how Lorenz managed to make it look so easy when he climbed in after him and began loosely reattaching the grate, but there was no time to dwell. Felix began immediately to pull himself with practiced motions through the vent towards his destination – the area above the staff room. Surprisingly, Lorenz’s technique of lying flat on his stomach and using his grip-gloved hands to do all the work, was extremely effective. Little to no noise accompanied him on his journey thanks to the soft material of his clothing – at least externally. His ear, however, was alive with the sound of Sylvain’s useless commentary.

“_Hey Claude, is this my left or Felix’s left?”_

_“Felix’s left.”_

_“Are you sure?”_

_“Yes,_” came Lorenz’s clipped and whispered interruption. “_Why on earth would we use _your_ position to navigate?”_

_“Cool, OK. Makes sense. Then you’re gonna want to take a left, Fe.”_

“The only direction I _can_ go is left, you idiot,” Felix grumbled, and winced at how loud even his _whispers_ sounded inside what was essentially a metal echo chamber. Sylvain just laughed in response, but Felix didn’t have the time, nor the energy to feel as sickeningly giddy as he usually did when Sylvain did pretty much anything. He was much too preoccupied with trying not to suffocate to death inside a tiny vent.

Really, Felix didn’t need Sylvain or Claude to tell him the way. He hadn’t spent the better part of eight hours memorising the plans for him _not_ to have committed it to memory, but it was gratifying nonetheless to hear Sylvain confirm the direction Felix was already taking. It wasn’t until he got to the slight uphill inclinations that he preferred to just let himself be instructed, rather than to waste the energy that he needed to pull himself along on _thinking._

By the time Sylvain said, “_OK stop here,”_ Felix was glad to finally be able to catch his breath. Lorenz was already well on his way to the security office – though he did have a few extra floors to traverse before arriving, so Felix had until he was done to glean something of use from the staff room now sitting directly below his position.

“_Do you see anyone inside the room?”_ Claude asked.

With one last steadying breath, Felix pulled himself a little further forwards until he could see through the vent grating and in to the staff room. From what he could immediately gather, it looked like the kind of room that had once been busy. Mess cluttered the tables in the form of snack wrappers and old food, and bits of paper were stuck to the walls with scrawled notes written upon them. However, at this late hour, and probably in part due to the reshuffling of staff, the room only housed two employees.

Felix turned his head so the tiny camera stuck to his face could see his hands, signed the practiced signal for ‘yes,’ and then ‘two’.

“_At least there are enough people to actually have a conversation,”_ Claude mused. “_Are they talking?”_

“Shut up and maybe I’ll find out,” was burning on the edge of his tongue, but the situation demanded silence, and so he was forced instead to sign a calm ‘no’.

The two employees were sitting in silence, preoccupied by whatever was on their phones, entirely disinterested in one another – he couldn’t even be certain that they were security. They very well could have been secretaries on break, in which case Felix was here for absolutely _nothing._ In his mind, that outcome ranked even higher in disappointment than getting caught and arrested – to have come all this way and dressed up like a fool to come back empty handed, when all day long everyone else had unearthed lead after lead. 

“_In that case, we’ll cut communication with you for a while, let you listen in while we catch up with Lorenz. Don’t worry though, we can still hear you. If anything happens, get to a safe place and contact us.”_

The line cut off without Felix bothering to acknowledge the orders, and he took solace in finally being alone with his own thoughts. How Claude and Sylvain had operated all day long with their earpieces in was a mystery for the ages. It was no wonder Leonie had turned hers off, Felix could barely hear himself think with all of the voices swimming around inside his head. Life was so much simpler when he only had to think about and for himself.

Movement below him caught his eye, tearing him away from his thoughts. His eye immediately flew to the disruption – one of the employees had gotten up from their seat, and Felix watched with rapt attention as they made their way over to… The fridge. To get a snack. And then sit back in their original seat to eat it.

“Fuck this,” Felix hissed under his breath. This was a waste of time. Claude had probably only sent him here to make him feel useful, but hell if it wasn’t having the opposite effect. There was no way he’d get anything useful out of two tired night-shift employees struggling to remain conscious. Felix truly was not built for espionage – he wanted nothing more than to drop from the vent and threaten the information he needed out of them. It would certainly be a whole lot easier and definitely a lot quicker. The only thing keeping him inside the vent was the lingering effect of the scolding from Dimitri, and spite really was the most powerful of motivators.

“What was that?”

Felix’s breath caught in his throat and he immediately shuffled back slightly. _Shit. _He hadn’t sworn _that_ loudly, had he?

“What?”

Felix couldn’t see the employees, but he could hear the concern in their voices, and with every passing second, his heart felt dangerously close to stopping altogether. “Didn’t you hear something?”

“Mia, don’t tell me they have you believing the ghost rumours too? Listen, I’ve been working here for four years, there aren’t any ghosts. It’s just Mr. Aegir’s associate from Hresvelg. Hubert-something.”

“No, I swear I heard something! Just now. It sounded like a voice.”

“Then it’s probably just the vents,” they said, and Felix’s whole body turned cold. They wouldn’t get up and check, would they? How quickly could he manoeuvre himself back out of this tunnel’s line of sight? Probably not quickly enough. Going backwards was a much harder job than going forwards. “They’ve been making a lot of weird sounds lately. You’d think for such an expensive building they’d install better ones.”

“Really? Vents can make noises like that?”

“Uh… sure? I mean it’s not like there’s gonna be some kind of super-secret spy agent up there,” they laughed and Felix almost joined in with a hysteric chuckle of his own. “There’s no way a human could fit inside one of those things. I’d place higher bets on it being an animal of some kind. Or the wind.”

"If you say so."

Felix saved his breath of relief, lest it come out too brazenly and blow his cover again. But just as his heart started beating at a regular pace, one of the employees spoke up and stopped it in its tracks once more.

“Well, I’m off,” they said with a rustle of fabric and a clattering of plates. “I’ve got to get myself a coffee before I swap security room shifts with Boyd.”

“Ha! Have fun watching cameras all night.”

“Joke’s on you. It’s my favourite pastime. You know, camera three does this hilarious thing where it flickers at precisely four-twenty a.m. Makes my whole night.”

“You need to get a new job, Python.”

“Yeah? Well we couldn’t all be lucky enough to get the golden ticket to Hresvelg.”

“Tell me about it. If only they’d sent secretaries too. I bet Hresvelg is way more interesting than this place. Especially when you’re stuck on the seventh floor. Nobody even _comes_ to the seventh floor.”

“Safe to say we’d certainly would see more action, that’s for sure. But I can’t even get Clair to tell me what’s going on over there. It’s like they’re all sworn to secrecy or something.”

“Or they have no idea.”

“Or that.” There was a pause, in which Felix tried to process everything he’d just heard. A million-and-one thoughts battled inside his mind, but they were all cut down by the more pressing issue that was the unforeseen shift change. “Well, toodles, or whatever. I’m off. Don’t get in to any trouble, kiddo.”

_Shit._

If anyone was in trouble, it was Lorenz.

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

\--LORENZ—

_“Lorenz, we have a problem,”_ Claude said with the urgency of someone about to take a nap. “_Shift change.”_

Lorenz fought the urge to groan. He’d just hauled himself up multiple steep inclinations, had just been about to unscrew the vent grating to lower himself in to the security office that the guard had conveniently vacated _moments ago_, and then… _this._ Shift changes were obviously, not uncommon, but Lorenz was usually lucky enough to time such things accordingly. He hadn’t banked on the Aegir building needing one – seeing as they were so critically understaffed. He supposed he could only had himself to blame for such a presumptuous blunder.

Keeping silent, Lorenz pocketed his infiltration tool and waited. He’d have to think of a way of getting whichever security guard took over the shift to leave the office for at least four minutes while he stole the required information and screwed the vent back in to place, but it was extremely difficult to conceive ideas when trapped between four unforgiving metal walls. He _could _get Lysithea to hack her way in to the systems to cause a disturbance, but that would jeopardise their stealthy approach, and once the Flame Emperor became aware they were being chased, Team Claude essentially lost another of their important chess pieces. They couldn’t afford to lose any more, not so early in the game.

Which left Lorenz with the even less desirable option of dropping in and knocking the guard unconscious. In other words, he needed to come up with something that wouldn’t compromise the entire mission, fast. A task made even harder without the possibility of communicating openly with Claude.

Before Lorenz could mould his thoughts in to something solid, the new security guard stepped inside and stopped directly below the vent grating to place a cup of steaming coffee on to the work desk.

“Lazy bastard left without saying goodbye,” the guard grumbled, sauntering over to the opposing desk of computer screens and tapping something in to the keyboard.

“_Are you thinking what I’m thinking, Lorenz?” _Claude asked, a sly smugness apparent in his voice even through the earpiece.

Lorenz rolled his eyes._ So cliché,_ he thought, hoping his silence would convey the same sentiment to Claude and his ridiculous idea. There had to be a better way, a more civilised way, than what he was suggesting.

“_It’s a good thing I gave you those, huh? Who knew you’d need them so soon?”_

Lorenz’s hand fell to his back pocket, where the plastic tube of laxatives remained from their earlier conversation. His attention then turned to the unfortunate security guard he would have to use them on. He was reluctant, but he could think of no better alternative. With an inaudible sigh, he popped the tube open and extracted two tablets.

“_Uh, I’d just use the one,”_ Claude said. _“I’m not completely certain of how well they work and I don’t want the poor guy’s ass to explode.”_

Lorenz made a face at the imagery and singled out one tablet. Honestly, Claude’s affinity for alchemy never ceased to amaze. On countless occasions he had procured the specific medicine needed to get them through a tight spot – a sleeping draught, or a pill to induce vomiting - as though he’d foreseen the outcome and already planned ahead. Tonight though, Lorenz just hoped the security guard didn’t drop dead; manslaughter was not on his bucket list.

“_Pierce the capsule and then drop it in the cup,” _Claude instructed, and Lorenz complied, using one of the attachments of his infiltration tool to poke a tiny hole in to the pill.

The guard was still tapping away at the screen when Lorenz lined up the shot through the grate. There was no graceful way to drop it from such a height without causing a small spectacle. All they could hope now, was that Lorenz didn’t miss, and that the guard didn’t notice the pill entering his cup, or they were well and truly finished.

When the guard sighed and instead decided to sit down in his office chair, Lorenz took the opportunity to drop the pill, hoping that the noise would serve as an adequate distraction. Time seemed to slow as the tiny capsule fell through the air, but it resumed once more when it landed in to the cup with a satisfactory _plop_. Luck definitely seemed to have changed its favour – the guard didn’t notice, and all that remained, was to wait.

“_I can’t wait to see if this actually works,” _Claude said with a clap of his hands.

“_You mean you don’t know if it does?” _Sylvain asked.

“_Oh it definitely does, I’m a genius. But I’ve never seen it in action. It’s a new recipe and I haven’t found the time to test it.”_

_“That means Caspar wasn’t around to be his guinea pig, and nobody else is dumb enough to try any of Claude’s creations,”_ Lysithea corrected.

_“You get Caspar to test your weird science projects? How is he still alive?”_

_“He’s surprisingly resistant,”_ Claude mused. “_What works relatively decently on Caspar is almost three times more effective on a regular human being.”_

_“Woah, what's that kid made of? Wait, no, actually, what’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever made him try?”_

Claude hummed, pondering the question. Really, in Lorenz’s opinion, there was only one correct answer, which coincidentally, was also the answer that Claude gave. _“Probably the hiccupping tablets.” _There was a pause, probably in which Sylvain looked at Claude as though he’d just grown another head. Then Claude explained,_ “He hiccupped every forty-five seconds for a week.” _

_“I thought Linhardt was going to murder you,” _Lysithea snickered_. “Especially when Caspar started screaming 'help' after every hiccup.” _

_“Hey, I compensated him considerably for his services,” _Claude laughed. “_I’ll bet he still has a few boxes of those protein bars sitting at home.”_

As amusing as they were to listen to, Lorenz held up a hand to silence the team when the guard moved. They complied immediately, and everybody watched with bated breath as he got up and began to sing with no tune in particular: “Coffee, coffee! I’m sick of the night shift and deserve my fucking coffee!”

Sylvain sounded truly harrowed when he said, “_Oh god.”_

_Too late now,_ Lorenz thought. His coffee was about to send him to the toilet for the foreseeable future.

It was almost distressing to watch the guard consume the sabotaged drink, even more so when he let out a satisfied sound after the first gulp and proclaimed that it was, “Some good fucking coffee.”

The moment between his first sip, and the moment that his face turned was agonisingly silent – a pin drop could have been heard by the entirety of the third floor. “What the fuck?” the guard said suddenly, eyebrows furrowing. “I didn’t even eat anything stale today.”

“_Claude, are we bad people?”_ Lysithea asked.

_“We are now,” _Claude said. “_This poor guy.”_

The team watched in unified sympathy as the guard let out a flurry of panicked curses, hands flying to clutch his stomach as the laxatives liquidised his innards. “Oh god, oh fuck! Oh _goddess_ it’s coming,” was the last thing he shouted before bolstering his way back out of his office and bolting towards the nearest bathroom.

“Are you satisfied now?” Lorenz asked when the coast was clear.

“_Not as much as I thought I’d be,” _Claude said. “_At least we know it works.”_

“Yes,” Lorenz said, unscrewing the vent grate as quickly as he could manage. “I suppose we do. Any idea on how long I have before he comes back?”

“_I don’t know. Couple of days?”_

_“What?”_ came Sylvain’s distressed reply.

_“Relax, I’m kidding,” _Claude laughed. “_But I mean, the dude’s violently pissing through his asshole right now with how much stuff I put in that capsule. So take from that what you will. Realistically speaking though, I’d estimate at least twenty minutes. You’ll be fine.”_

“I don’t even know where to begin in answering that,” Lorenz sighed as the grate came loose. He moved it aside and lowered himself in to the office, using the table directly below him to minimise noise and ease the descent. As soon as he climbed down, he closed the office door and then settled himself in to the chair facing over ten different security camera monitors.

“_You’re looking for the main computer tower underneath the desk,” _Lysithea said. “_Once you plug it in, I’ll remotely control the monitors and take what we need.”_

Lorenz was glad that Lysithea didn’t trust anyone other than the tech team to attempt downloading intel – just looking at the monitors almost gave him a headache. Still, he was educated enough to know what a tower looked like, and plugged the device she’d given him in to the piece of machinery sitting snuggly underneath the desk.

While Lysithea worked, Lorenz took the time to fish the laxative pill capsule out of the guard’s mug, and to snoop around the office. If laxative plans weren’t so unreliable, Lorenz might have insisted on using them a whole lot more often. It certainly was nice to take his time and not have to worry about completing his mission in under three minutes.

In his wait for Lysithea to work her magic, the monitors caught his attention. The building was quiet, as expected for nearing one in the morning, and next to nobody was roaming the hallways on any of the floors. All bar one – the ninth floor. Lorenz couldn’t touch anything, for fear of messing up whatever Lysithea was doing, but he did get up and take a closer look at the screen displaying the corridor outside of Ferdinand Aegir’s office.

“Mr. Aegir certainly likes to work late,” Lorenz said to nobody in particular.

“_He’s still there?” _Sylvain asked.

Lorenz watched who he knew to be Ferdinand Aegir conversing in the hallway with the man Claude and Sylvain had accosted earlier that morning – Hubert. “Hm, yes,” Lorenz said. “He’s still here along with the man you called a vampire. They’re talking behind their hands like a pair of gossip mongers. Something to hide from even the company, perhaps?”

“_Interesting,” _Claude said. “_We’ll see soon enough whether or not that’s a common occurrence. Felix had something interesting to say about the staff over at Hresvelg too, so it’s certainly a possibility.”_

_“And I’m done,”_ Lysithea said, drawing out the ‘and’. “_You can take the device and go.” _

“_Nice job team,” _Claude said. “Now _let’s get home and rest before I put you all to work on three weeks’ worth of security footage.”_

“How utterly enthralling,” Lorenz drawled, unplugging the device and climbing back up on to the table. “There’s nothing I love more than staring at tiny laptop screens until my brain goes numb.”

“_Don’t worry,” _Claude chuckled. _“I’ll keep you entertained.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope everyone had a great new year! here's to more of whatever this nonsense is in 2020!!


	10. THE WATCH BEGINS

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OOOOH boi im so sorry this took so long

CHAPTER TEN: CLAUDE

THE WATCH BEGINS

Claude grinned at the group of tired zombies gathered in his hotel room, lounging in a circle of pulled up chairs and piled up pillows. Aside from the serial early risers, almost all of the team were fighting sleep to some degree. Even Marianne was trying to stifle a yawn behind her hand. “It’s so nice to see the team back together again,” Claude said with what he knew to be an annoyingly loud clap. To his extreme satisfaction, several people jumped, and a few others cursed under their breath. “I missed looking at Caspar’s face.”

Caspar threw his arms out as though expecting a hug and beamed. “I missed you too, boss! I’ve gotta be completely honest with you, Hilda just doesn’t treat me right.”

Hilda, who was still trying to sleep upon Marianne’s shoulder, made a disgruntled sound. “It’s so early,” she groaned. “Can’t you shut the fuck up for a few more minutes?”

“It’s ten,” Claude reminded her. “Which is definitely _not_ early, and it is definitely not Caspar’s fault that you engaged in unauthorised, extracurricular activities when you should have been sleeping.”

Hilda didn’t even bother to open her eyes. “Shut up, virgin.”

“Moving swiftly on,” Claude said after clearing his throat. “It’s time to start debriefing. Team Hilda, since you’re feeling so enthusiastic, why don’t you start?”

With another exaggerated groan, Hilda said, “Fuck you,” waved her hand around until it found Ignatz seated behind her, and then gave him a prompting smack to the leg.

Ignatz just sighed and took over. “We were able to recover the security footage with little problem. I’ve already started formatting it and separating it out on to flash drives.”

Claude smiled. “Great, nice work. Happen upon anything strange on your travels?”

“Oh! Tell them what I did!” Caspar cut in with a light dig of the elbow in to Ignatz’s side. He excitedly raised his eyebrows at Claude, and then continued himself anyway, “You’re not gonna believe what I did.”

Ignatz’s sigh was grave. “Caspar was able to find what we believe to have been the listening room.”

“There was a laptop!” Caspar interrupted again, bouncing slightly from his seat on the bed. “But when Linhardt got in there, they’d already taken it.”

Everybody turned to Linhardt for confirmation, but he was, for lack of a better term, _dead._ Caspar had carried him in to sit with the rest of the team, but it was highly unlikely that he’d grace them with his conscious presence by waking. Later on, Claude would find Linhardt alive and well on the other side of his own laptop screen in the form of a thousand sarcastically-worded emails documenting the research he’d likely spent the whole night digging for. But for something as crucial as debriefing, he’d inevitably stay comatose, no matter how much of a priority Claude made it.

“Linhardt told me to tell you that he found this too,” Caspar said on his behalf, brandishing something small and sparkly in his hand. “He picked this up from the floor in the listening room. Probably belonged to whoever was spying on the big boss man!”

Claude reached over and took what Caspar was holding. It was a brooch. The very same brooch that Claude seen the day before, right down to the angling of the petals, and the bejewelled black centre.

“That’s a creepy smile,” Leonie said. “What is it?”

“Sylvain,” Claude said instead of answering. He held up the brooch up for him to see. “Recognise this?”

Sylvain’s eyes widened immediately and he blinked away his shock to get up and get a closer look. “Petra’s brooch!” he said, turning it over in his hands. “But how’d it get to Varley?”

“It didn’t,” Claude smiled and took the brooch back. “This either means that somebody in Adrestia needs to think of a more creative birthday present, or they’re working as an organised team.”

“It is as you feared then,” Lorenz sighed. “Combined resources from three separate Hresvelg companies.”

Claude hummed, brain quickly sorting through all of the information, trying to make sense of everything they’d obtained thus far. “It would appear so,” he sighed. “Though, it really is a shame they took off with that laptop. With that in our hands, we’d probably have found the locket already.”

“I could go and get it tonight,” Lorenz said, casually crossing one long leg over the other, as though he wasn’t suggesting something extremely difficult. 

Claude mulled it over for a moment, weighing up the pros and cons of another attempt on the Varley building. High-risk, high-reward situations were usually Claude’s forte, but something about this whole case still had him on edge.

“That’s really sexy of you to say, Lorenz, but I think it would be for the best if we lay low for a day or two. We don’t know what kind of people we’re dealing with here. It could very well be a trap, and we don’t even know where it’s been taken.”

Lorenz raised an eyebrow as though surprised by the rejection, but he didn’t push the subject any further. In truth, the last thing Claude wanted was to become overconfident and complacent. If Varley Prints had somehow managed to realise they’d been infiltrated, then it was almost a certainty their security would increase overnight. Claude would even bet on them setting out some kind of bait to lure out the thief, or worse yet, something bugged that would lead straight back to the team.

“Speaking of traps,” Claude said very suddenly, looking down at the brooch in his hand. “Lysithea, catch.”

Lysithea caught the brooch and stared at it. “What do you want me to do with this?”

“Check it all over for bugs or tracking devices. I’m not taking any chances. If you find something, let me know immediately. We’ll need to abandon ship.”

There was an uncomfortable shuffle of clothing as the team considered the idea of being bugged. Lysithea closed her palm around the brooch as if to smother any hypothetical microphones, but if they really were sitting in a trap, there was little they could do about it now, other than to rely on the three dozen or so contingency plans Claude had in place for such an outcome, and hope that one of them worked.

“Do you really think they’d counter attack us like that?” Raphael asked in his usual jovial tone. “They can’t know we’re on to them yet, right? That usually takes a little while.”

That much was usually true. In their experience, when someone was being chased, they only retaliated once they got desperate. For someone to throw traps out this early would not only mean that they were already aware of Claude’s involvement, but had also been expecting it. That certainly was a cause for concern. They needed to eliminate that possibility as soon as possible.

“The Flame Emperor isn’t like our usual thieves,” Lorenz reminded him. “But I have to agree that we are a little too early in to the investigation to warrant any kind of retaliation. It would certainly be unusual.”

“If the Flame Emperor is working with one of the largest business conglomerates in Adrestia, then who’s to say they’re not already ten steps ahead of us?” Claude asked, to which the room fell silent again in contemplation. “Unpredictability will be our biggest asset in this case. Nothing makes a mastermind more frustrated than their bait veering off course and destroying all of their meticulously organised plans.”

Team Claude would know that more than anyone after the disastrous Acheron case. The countless hours spent smugly planning the retrieval from his mansion had gone to shit the moment they had stepped foot inside, and the reminder of such a case seemed to prompt most of the team in to agreement. With a frown, Lysithea made an immediate start on the brooch, powering up her laptops and tapping furiously through her self-made programmes. Humiliation, it seemed, was a great motivator.

Once everybody seemed to be in agreement, Claude continued. “Does anyone from Team Hilda have anything else to add?”

“Um, we also got an invitation printed using the silver ink,” Marianne said. “Linhardt has already done a few tests on it, and while he says it’s not _entirely_ conclusive that Varley Prints was the one who printed the Flame Emperor’s card, they definitely used the same ink.”

“Which basically means they did print it,” Caspar added.

Claude grinned in an attempt to lighten the mood up some – it had taken a severe dip upon the realisation that they might not be totally safe. “Do you see that, Leonie? Do you see how seamlessly Team Hilda’s infiltration went?”

Leonie groaned and buried her face in to her hands. “How long is this going to last?”

Claude pretended to think about it for a moment, and then answered, “Until someone else does something worse.”

Immediately, Leonie turned and looked at Caspar. He didn’t notice for a while, lost in a world of his own, picking at the frayed holes in his jeans, but when he did, he frowned. “Wait, why are you looking at me?” he asked, brows drawn together in confusion.

“Do something worse,” Leonie prompted.

Caspar had never looked more affronted. “What? No! Do it yourself!”

“That completely defeats the point!”

Claude held up a silencing hand. “On account of his good work, Caspar has officially earned himself immunity from any and all insults for the next three days. And that includes insults from the newbies too.”

Felix hadn’t said a word from his place by the window, but when all the eyes in the room found him he rolled his eyes, but kept his mouth firmly closed. He was likely still pissed that he hadn’t solved the case himself from up inside the Aegir building’s ventilation system, but his injured ego was his own problem. If _Claude_ still hadn’t made any major breakthroughs, then Felix could remain secluded in his little corner, thinking himself to death for the foreseeable future.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Lysithea interjected. “Caspar found that room _accidentally!”_

“No,” Caspar crossed his arms over his chest and pouted. “Linhardt said I found it because my ‘intuition is unparalleled’.”

“Linhardt’s your boyfriend, of course he’s going to say that,” Leonie scoffed.

“Oh, wow. I can feel your petty jealousy from all the way over here, Leo,” Hilda snickered, finally deeming the conversation interesting enough to wake up. “Did someone get rejected?”

“Funny you should say that,” Lysithea said, a mischievous grin spreading across her face. “Ignatz, Leonie got Sandra killed.”

Ignatz groaned and slapped a hand to his forehead. “Come _on,_ Leo. Not again. I literally just finished the last one!”

“I’m sorry!” Leonie said, throwing her hands in the air and slumping back in her seat. “You know what, I’m going to take over debriefing on our end, because I won’t tolerate any further slander on my good name.” She stood up and clasped her hands together as though she were about to give a speech, and continued. “I got arrested because of a small case of miscommunication. Nothing more, nothing less. Anything other stories will be considered unlawful and deceitful.”

“Lies,” Lysithea disguised behind a cough.

“You beat that guy up for literally no reason,” Sylvain said sadly. “Sounded like he was having a real rough day too.”

Leonie’s scowl was venomous. “Oh yeah? Well I’m not the one that made at least eight people in the Aegir building wish they’d never been born.”

“That is nothing but a compliment,” Sylvain said with a bow. “Also, that was my job, and your boss was partially responsible.”

Knowing she couldn’t argue with that, Leonie huffed and turned around to point at her next victim. “What about Lorenz? He made someone shit themselves. Why am I the only one being reprimanded?”

“Again, Claude is partially responsible,” Lorenz said. "I would have preferred to have used a less... explosive method."

Team Hilda all sat up in unison, faces contorting in to varying degrees of shock. “Lorenz made someone _shit_ themselves? Oh my _god_,” Caspar groaned. “Was it messy? Was it loud? Did you use one of Claude’s special pills?” Before anyone could answer him, he threw his arms in the air in defeat. “Argh, why the fuck was I stuck dressing up like a teenager on the boring team?”

“Hey! I bought you food,” Hilda said, her face bordering disgusted. “You ungrateful fuck.”

“_Marianne_ bought us food. You were just going to pick us up whatever was easiest to carry home.”

The room soon devolved in to a chaotic mess of further insults and arguments as the team, sans Linhardt, gained full consciousness. Claude watched on in amusement for a while as Lysithea tried to block everything out, and Caspar tried valiantly to enforce the ‘no insult’ rule.

When the noise levels broke acceptable, Lorenz caught his eye and sent him an extremely displeased frown, as though pleading with him to take control of the situation. But Claude let them continue with little more than a shrug. It was better for them to expel their energy before they finished debriefing and ultimately got stuck behind laptops for the next few days. Even Felix had joined in, albeit in not as good nature as the others, throwing insults back at whoever tried to taunt him.

After a while, the noise finally quietened enough for Claude to clear his throat and it actually be heard above the arguing. “Are we all done?” he asked, looking around the room. “Can I actually finish debriefing without expecting another riot?”

Everybody nodded, and Claude began running through the facts gathered during his and Sylvain’s initial reconnaissance mission, from the intel gathered about Edelgard, to the reshuffling of staff from the Aegir building to Hresvelg. When he moved on to divulging the details concerning Lorenz and Felix’s infiltration, nobody interrupted him with any further unnecessary comments, only honest questions and suggestions until everybody was up to date and ready to seriously begin the final organisation of facts.

“So we have three companies all somehow involved,” Leonie started. “All three of them were picked up transmitting signals from the bugged device we found in Blaidydd’s office."

“One building definitely had a listening room – a laptop and headphones were left on a desk in a secluded office room with no security footage covering the corridor,” Caspar continued.

Lorenz then took over, fingers touching his chin as he contemplated the facts in real time. “The second building has sacrificed a large portion of its security force and sent it over to the Hresvelg building. Whether or not that decision was mandatory or voluntary is still undetermined, but nevertheless, the finger now points at building three, and what lies there that warrants such high scale protection.”

“Building three, the Hresvelg building, is the largest of the three and the home of Edelgard Hresvelg – the CEO and owner,” Claude said, taking the reins. “I think it’s safe to assume that each of the respective building owners play some kind of part in this whole scheme. As for the mastermind – that’s still undetermined. Any one of them could have asked for help from the others, being that they all operate under the Hresvelg conglomerate. We cannot rule any one of them out yet. Though I still can’t wrap my brain around the _why._”

“Which still leaves us to look around the Hresvelg building,” Ignatz said. “It’s a much busier, and much larger building, which will make it a lot harder to find the information we seek. But, I did some digging last night and found that the company is still hiring security staff. It seems as though the acquisition from Aegir still isn't enough.”

“Which means they’re either about to host a large event, or they’re paranoid about something.” Claude hummed. “I think we’ve just found our next way in.”

Ignatz adjusted his glasses like a movie villain, a satisfied smile creeping across his face. “I was hoping you’d say that. I’ve already forged and filled in their applications. Though I’ll have to redo Leonie’s,” he muttered.

“Wait, what’s happening?” Felix asked, suddenly lost.

“Leonie, Raphael, and Caspar are getting new jobs is what’s happening.”

“Redemption!” Leonie shouted. “Are we doing deep security espionage?”

“Espionage!” Caspar whispered loudly, holding out a fist towards Raphael.

Raphael returned the gesture with an equally as loud and equally as excited whispered, “Espionage!”

Claude levelled them all with a stare. “If you don’t mess up your interviews, then yes. More espionage.”

The three more commonly referred to as ‘muscle’ had gotten extra jobs as security, cleaners, and personal bodyguards many times before now. Blending in to the background, they took up mundane jobs whilst bugged, gathering all sorts of information and asking all sorts of sensitive questions without raising suspicion. Because if there was one thing all three of them could do extremely well, it was play the clueless idiot.

“Wait, aren’t the newbies _professional_ security guards?” Hilda asked. “Why don’t we send them too? Get them out of my sight for a while.”

Felix looked to Claude in agreement, and while Claude knew he was raring for something productive to do, unfortunately for Felix, this was not it.

“No,” was the simple answer. “Without disguises, I’m not comfortable sending Dimitri’s two closest guards out for an indefinite amount of time behind enemy lines. If the Flame Emperor knows Dimitri’s safe combination, you can guarantee they know your faces. We’ll blow our cover before we even begin.”

Felix scowled and stood straight from his lean against the wall. “So put me in a disguise, forge me an ID, I don’t care.”

“Now isn’t that a startling change,” Lorenz smirked, voice edging towards mockery. “Just yesterday you were doubting our morality in using Linhardt’s app, and now here you are, requesting forged documentation.”

“Shut up,” he snapped. “Hillary is right. We’re security. We should go too.”

Hilda choked on her snack. “Who the _fuck_ is Hillary?”

“_Hillary _just wants to get rid of you,” Claude said. “She wouldn’t care if the both of you got scooped up by the police and locked in a cell indefinitely. But _I_ need you here. Safe and sound. Watching over the security footage like good little children, because your boss is paying me good money to make sure of it.”

Felix let an angry huff out through his nose. He probably could have argued his case all day long, but with so many eyes on him pleading to follow Claude’s instruction, Felix acquiesced and slumped back against the wall mumbling, “That’s bullshit.”

“No it’s not,” Claude sang. “It’s the smart thing to do. Now, Ignatz, get sending those applications out. Lysithea, carry on with the brooch and let me know if you find anything. Everyone else, grab a laptop and a memory drive, and start looking for anything suspicious inside the Aegir and Varley buildings from the last week.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

Hilda lasted two hours before she started to complain. In the group chat that she’d muted on account of it being ‘too boring,’ Claude had set up a wager the night before. Bets had been placed, predicting how long it would take for her to say the words, “Ugh, my eyes hurt,” and surprisingly, it had taken a lot longer than they’d expected. Claude’s own guess of fifteen minutes had long since passed.

“Two hours and three minutes,” Claude said, checking his watch. “Who was closest?”

Caspar jumped up and waved his hand around, almost sending his laptop to the floor. “I said two hours!”

“So Linhardt wins,” Leonie shook her head sadly and shuffled the laptop on her knee to get more comfortable. “And he wasn’t even awake to see it. Typical.”

“Wait, why does Lin get the—oh yeah.” Caspar hung his head. “I forgot.”

Linhardt had tried to give the same guess as Caspar, too lazy to come up with a guess of his own. But after the last betting incident had resulted in Lysithea and Leonie almost getting in to a fist fight, the rules demanded differing answers, lest death ensue. After a barrage of complaints, Linhardt had given two hours and one minute as a compromise. Who knew it would have won him the pot?

“You’re all motherfuckers,” Hilda said around a yawn. “Someone make me a coffee or I’m taking a nap.”

“I was just about to make some tea,” Marianne said, slipping her headphones off and setting her laptop aside. “Does anyone else want anything?”

"Nah," Leonie said. "I'm going back to mine and Lys's room. I'll pick something up on the way."

The excitement of something other than a screen of security footage soon died out once everyone realised Hilda didn’t care that they’d capitalised on her laziness, or that Linhardt was still dead, unable to bask in his rewards. Marianne took orders from those who had opted to still lounge around in Claude and Lorenz’s room rather than their own, and then silence fell over them once more as they returned to their work.

With a steaming cup of hotel-room-coffee, Claude brought his own attention back to his screen and the section of the Aegir building he was responsible for – Ferdinand Aegir’s corridor. They’d all started the search three days prior to the stealing of the locket; if something was amiss or suspicious about any of these buildings, they’d likely find it in the few days before or after the robbery. But even _Claude_ was bored watching the corridor remain empty for hours of fast-forwarded footage at a time.

At eight a.m. Ferdinand would walk in to his office room, briefcase in hand, donned in an expensive suit, and he wouldn’t leave it again until almost ten at night. His appointments would come and go with little drama, carrying their own briefcases, or brandishing thick stacks of paper, but without a camera inside Mr. Aegir’s office there was no way of telling whether or not any one of them was a cause for suspicion. The only interesting thing about the days’ worth of footage was that Hubert seemed to be a frequent visitor, coming and going in the intervals that Ferdinand had no meetings.

Intrigued and acting on impulse, Claude paused his surveillance and pulled up Linhardt’s background checking programme, immediately typing Hubert’s name and what details he had gathered in to the search engine. There were a few ‘Huberts’ but without a last name, Claude was forced to click and check each and every profile individually, study their faces, and eliminate them as the man he was looking for. It took a little while of studying complete strangers, but eventually, Claude found Hubert Vestra at the bottom of the alphabetised list in all of his gothic glory.

Oddly enough, there wasn’t much information readily available, which meant that Hubert either took extreme caution in doctoring his own digital footprint, or generally didn’t do much. Claude highly doubted the latter, considering he seemed to be involved with Ferdinand Aegir himself.

Even more interesting, was the little information that _was_ available. Officially, Hubert Vestra worked for Edelgard Hresvelg, but the job title was unknown, and so was any other information on the work he’d completed. Hypothetically assuming Edelgard Hresvelg, the owner of all the companies, was in fact the mastermind, Claude was inclined to assume that made Hubert some kind of second-in-command. He certainly looked the part.

“Listen up,” Claude said, fiddling with his editing software to compile all of Hubert's information. “I’m sending out a picture, I want everyone to be on the lookout for this man too, OK? If you see him, let me know ASAP. Especially those looking at the Varley footage.”

“Who is he?” Marianne asked.

“A new friend Sylvain and I met on our travels,” Claude grinned as he sent out the image. Multiple devices around the room _pinged_ and _beeped_ as they received the message, and Lorenz was the first to speak up over from the desk he had claimed.

“Hubert?” he asked with a raised eyebrow. “You think he’s involved?”

“I just checked out his profile,” Claude explained. “He works directly for Edelgard Hresvelg under an undisclosed title. Plus, he frequently visits Ferdinand Aegir’s office. Like, _really_ frequently.”

“They could just be fucking,” Hilda said offhandedly.

Lorenz sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “It is with extreme sorrow and regret that I must agree with Hilda. He could simply be visiting as a friend, or as a significant other.”

“Uh, yeah, that’s cool and all, but he still could also be our super villain. Why else would he dress up like a vampire on a daily basis?”

“Because he likes it?” Marianne tried.

“Yeah, that doesn’t sound plausible at all. He’s definitely up to something. Keep your eyes peeled. If he turns up somewhere else, then we’ll know I was right and a genius.”

“I can’t even argue with him because his hunches are never wrong,” Hilda sighed. “Fine, I’ll look out for your vampire man. But it’s going to cost you.”

“Hilda, I already pay you.”

“And? This is extra labour. I’m going to need at least a ten percent raise for this.”

“I’ll order us food?”

Hilda mulled it over. “That can work. I’m picking the place though. Lorenz can fuck off if he thinks we’re ordering from that fancy soup place again.”

“Yeah that sucked,” Caspar added, face visibly disgusted as he remembered the taste. “And I’ve tasted Claude’s vomiting gummies.”

“That was one time,” Lorenz said almost desperately. “It was a cold winter evening, and I ordered those dishes with everybody’s best interests in mind.”

“And I _still_ got the flu the next day,” Hilda shook her head. “All men do is lie.”

Before he could add to the woes of how bad the soup was, Claude’s phone started lighting up with multiple replies from the rest of the team.

** **

_\--Raph The Tank 2:24pm_

** _WHO IS THIS MAN? _ **

** **

_\--Felix 2:24pm_

** _k_ **

\--_Brett 2:25pm_

** _hubert the vampire?_ ** ** _ ;_ ** ** _P I thought he was suspicious too!! he has the _ ** ** _ ~_ ** ** _ villain vibes_ ** ** _~ _ **

** **

_\--a child 2:25pm_

** _no, fuck u_ **

** **

“See that?” Claude held his phone up for Hilda to see. “Even the newbies believe in me more than you. Maybe I should just hire Sylvain. He’d increase my ego by like, four-hundred percent.”

“But would you be prepared to deal with Lorenz’s jealous pining?” Hilda asked with a vicious smile. “I’m not sure the rest of the team deserves that kind of punishment. It’s already bad enough.”

Claude caught Lorenz’s eye and smirked, already so used to the relentless teasing that it had become almost normal for them to just treat it as an ongoing joke, rather than to actually address the issue. “Haha, why would Lorenz be pining? That’s totally ridiculous, right, Lorenz?”

Lorenz rolled his eyes and said with a flat voice, “Yes, totally ridiculous. Ludicrous even.”

“Besides, I’m thinking of making Lorenz my second-in-command anyway,” Claude said, turning his head away from Hilda with an air of fake nonchalance. “He doesn’t insult me _nearly_ as much as you do.”

“Bullshit, Lorenz used to call you all sorts of mean stuff when he first joined us.”

“_Used_ to, Hilda. Now he only calls me an idiot and questions my judgement _affectionately_.”

“Can we _please_ refrain from talking about the past me,” Lorenz said with a grimace. "Lest you start talking about how horrid my choice of hairstyle was."

Claude laughed, but obliged. It truly was fun to think about how volatile Lorenz had once been in regards to working alongside Claude. Having only ever worked for his father’s mediocre retrieval team, Lorenz wasn’t used to seeing how one fronted by a genius operated. And so, on a particularly strange case in which the two rivalling teams had been duped by their own employers and forced to work together, Lorenz had witness first-hand the clear difference in their efficiency, and Claude had paid particular attention to how Lorenz’s obvious talents were being stifled by the family business.

Once the case was solved by Claude and his team, and the painting had been safely returned to its owner, he pulled Lorenz aside and asked whether or not he wanted to join their team that was severely lacking a confident infiltrator. Initially, Lorenz had refused, but Claude had insisted on giving him a business card.

Two weeks later, Lorenz had shown up on their doorstep claiming his ‘talents were being wasted,’ and that he was ‘only temporarily joining them in order to make a point to his father’. On their first few missions together, Lorenz had done nothing but question Claude’s authority, and act without consultation, but he soon realised Claude’s genius, and fell in with the rest of the team as though he’d been with them from the start. Years later, and he still hadn’t given his father an answer as to when he might be returning.

“But it’s so much fun,” Hilda said. “Remember when you used to lecture Claude about etiquette and snobbery?”

“I will never stop trying to teach this team basic good manners,” Lorenz said. “No matter how fruitless an endeavour.”

“Good luck with that,” Caspar said. “I don’t even like etiquettes. They taste awful.”

Everybody looked at him strangely. Claude held back a smile. “Uh, Caspar. Care to clarify what you think etiquette is?”

“Those little fried balls of food?”

“Croquettes,” Lorenz said sadly.

“Ah.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

\--FELIX—

Felix shuffled in his seat. Staring at a computer screen waiting for something interesting to happen wasn’t too far from his job of standing beside Dimitri waiting for something interesting to happen, but the stifling feeling of being locked inside for so long was starting to get to him. A headache was beginning to creep behind his eyes, and Sylvain seemed intent on worsening it.

“So what happened during the infiltration? Are you gonna tell me now? Was it everything you dreamed?”

“I’m busy,” Felix said, rubbing at his eyes and stretching his legs out underneath the table.

Sylvain got up from his spot on the bed, balanced the laptop on his palm and sat on the edge of Felix’s desk. “We’re both doing the same thing,” he said, a teasing edge to his voice. “It doesn’t require that much concentration, and you can’t avoid gushing about it forever. I know you want to.”

Felix paused his surveillance. “What do you want me to say?”

There was a pause in which Sylvain studied him for a moment. Felix huffed and tried to ignore how his gaze made his skin feel alive. “You know you can’t hide it from me, right?” Sylvain asked with a smirk.

“Hide what?”

“How much fun you’re having. You can glare at everyone as much as you like, but I haven’t seen you this lively since Cornelia tried to kill us.”

Sylvain wasn’t wrong. Somehow, he was never wrong when it came to knowing Felix, but that didn’t mean he was going to admit it. It was frustrating enough just to acknowledge.

“Anything is more interesting than watching Dimitri eat cheese and do paperwork for seven hours a day.”

“Yeah, but you’ve been different these past few days,” he said, and when Felix raised an inquisitive eyebrow in response, Sylvain continued. “You’ve been scowling less.”

“Why would you pay attention to something like that?” Felix grumbled. Sometimes he thought he understood Sylvain, but then sometimes, Felix found he had absolutely no clue what the other was thinking.

Sylvain hummed and finally put his precariously balanced laptop down before it fell and smashed to pieces. Felix wanted to say something reprimanding, like ‘_Get back to work and stop wasting time,’_ but the words died on his tongue, much like all of the other things he wanted to say but could never articulate in a way that didn’t sound venomous.

“Why wouldn’t I?”

They looked at each other in silence for a long time before Felix turned away with a small smile on his lips, and his cheeks burning, muttering, “I thought I told you not to say things like that when you don’t mean it.”

Sylvain, for once, actually looked perplexed. “And I told you, I always mean what I say when it’s to you. That night wasn’t just--”

“Don’t,” Felix cut in before he could say anything more. The last thing he wanted to do was talk about that disastrous night again. He was putting it behind him, and he had thought Sylvain was too. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

Sylvain went to say something more, but thankfully, thought better of it and sighed. “Fine. But one day, you’ll let me explain and we’ll both be happier for it.”

And that was precisely why Felix could never let that happen, because maybe, Sylvain’s idea of happy was vastly different from his own. Sylvain probably lived in a world where ‘happy’ meant pretending it had never happened, like he hadn’t said anything, and that they could carry on being best friends without that weight hanging over them. But Felix’s version of happy… didn’t matter anymore. Couldn’t matter anymore. He had to forget it no matter how many pretty things Sylvain said to him. That way, it would be easier to deal with later on.

“Oh, hey,” Sylvain said suddenly, thankfully shifting the mood away from whatever _that_ was. “I just got a message from Claude. He wants us to look out for any signs of Hubert.”

“That guy you harassed?”

“Yeah, the vampire guy.”

Surely enough, Felix’s phone also lit up with a message, despite him not having given up his number. A picture of Hubert filled the screen in the style of a WANTED poster, captioned with his name and details, and signed off with several bat emojis. And here Felix had been concerned that his five minute conversation had derailed the investigation, when the rest of the team seemed to be playing around in editing programmes.

Felix sent back a quick reply and turned back to his laptop to continue working. He tried his best to concentrate on the corridor housing Petra’s office, but Sylvain still hadn’t removed himself from the end of the desk, and out of the corner of his eye, Felix watched him smiling at his phone as he continued texting.

“Ingrid wants to call us,” he said eventually. “I’ll put her on speaker.”

Felix sighed and paused the surveillance again as Sylvain’s ringtone sounded and Ingrid’s voice flooded the otherwise quiet room.

“Ingrid!” Sylvain grinned, holding the phone between them. “You are live.”

_“What’s up, morons? How’s the investigation going?” _

“You’re interrupting us,” Felix said.

“_Sylvain literally just texted saying you were free.”_

When Felix scowled at him, Sylvain just laughed. “We’re more or less free,” he explained. “We’ve been going for like, two hours. We needed a break. Besides, I wanted to hear how much the office is missing us!”

“_Not at all,” _Ingrid deadpanned. “_It’s so quiet and peaceful here without you. Dedue even got Dimitri to take a day off so now we _all_ have the day off. You two should leave more often.”_

“What the fuck? You’re telling me Dedue managed to get _Dimitri_ to leave the office for the day?” Felix asked, sceptical. The last time he’d taken a proper day off had been after the ‘almost assassination’. And even then, despite literally everybody around him insisting otherwise, he had returned to work not two days later.

“_Yeah, I couldn’t believe it either. Fiancé privileges I guess. But he seriously looked on the verge of collapsing. He’s been pulling more hours because he’s restless over this locket. Have you made any progress?”_

“We’re getting there,” Sylvain said, sharing a look with Felix. “It’s hard to say what’s really going on right now but we’ve already made a lot of headway. Tell Dimitri to stop worrying. We’ll get it back.”

“_Ha! You try telling that idiot to stop worrying. It’s impossible. If he wasn’t worrying over the locket he’d be worrying about you two.”_

“That’s stupid,” Felix said. “Tell him I’ll stab him myself if he even so much as _thinks_ of worrying about me.”

“_Yeah, you can just tell him that yourself. I’m not getting involved in that mess,” _Ingrid laughed._ “So how’s the team? Are they nice?”_

“Uh, sure,” Sylvain said. “It’s kinda hard to fit in when Felix keeps cursing at them, but I think they’re starting to like us.”

“Hillary literally said she wanted us both out of her sight.”

“Oh my god, Felix. Her name is Hilda.” He threw his arms up in the air, taking the phone with him. “This is why they hate us!”

“What’s the difference? I bet she doesn’t know our names either.”

Ingrid’s voice was distant until Sylvain settled the phone between them again. _“Felix, you’d better not be acting like a baby again. I practically made a living out of scolding Sylvain when we were growing up, don’t make me have to start lecturing you too.”_

Felix rolled his eyes. “Did you call just to boss us around all the way from Faerghus?”

“_I’ll boss you around from anywhere, Felix, if you’re being a little bastard. Is he being a bastard, Sylvain?”_

Felix glared at him, his eyes screaming, ‘_I dare you to rat me out.’_

“No, he’s, uh, being really… uh…”

“_He’s being a bastard.”_

“Yeah.”

Felix scoffed. “Fuck you both. But especially fuck you, Ingrid. I was going to get you a girl’s number but now you can suffer.”

“You were going to give Ingrid Leonie’s number?” Sylvain asked, an eyebrow raised. When Felix took more than a few seconds to respond, he continued, “Did you even remember Leonie’s name before I just reminded you?”

“No,” he admitted. “But that’s not the point. They’re both single and never shut up about wanting girlfriends. They’re perfect for each other.”

“_Wow, not every lesbian has to date, you know.” _There was a pause in which Felix held up his hand and mimicked counting down from three, waiting for the inevitable question. Surely enough, Ingrid continued once Felix’s hands showed zero, and Sylvain hid a laugh behind his hand._ “But on a serious note, is she hot? Is she single?”_

“Yes to both. But that doesn’t matter anymore. You blew it.”

“_Sylvain, hit him for me.”_

Sylvain leaned back on the desk, smile wide as he contemplated Felix. “Hey now, I’m self-destructive, not stupid.”

“_Whatever. I’m sick of talking to you already. I’m going riding with Ashe and Mercie for the rest of the afternoon, so I’ll call you soon to check you’re not still being stupid. Stay safe, both of you.”_

“Bye horse girl, say hello to Goblin for me,” Sylvain said.

“_Ashe is going to be so pissed that you thought of the horse before him.”_

“Ashe isn’t my favourite horse.”

_“No, he’s your human friend that’s been asking me to call and check up on you both for three days straight.”_

Felix clicked his tongue. “Tell him my threat still stands. No worrying.”

“_Yeah, yeah. Or you’ll stab him?”_

“Not Ashe, no. Do you think I’m some kind of monster?”

“_Considering you almost fought a seven-year-old child once because you thought they were looking strangely at Dimitri, I mean, yeah. Kinda.”_

Felix frowned at the phone. “Don’t twist it, he was suspicious-looking.”

“Yeah, _I’m going to hang up now. Remember the three B’s. Be nice, be safe, be--”_

“—Boobs--” Sylvain interrupted with a satisfied smile.

“—_be_have_,_” Ingrid emphasised. “_But also boobs. Yeah.” _

“Goodbye, mother,” Felix said, trying to hurry Ingrid off the phone. The conversation had already lasted way longer than it should have. Fifteen minutes of wasted time when Dimitri was having a stress-induced breakdown - it really was worse than he’d thought.

Ingrid eventually hung up and Sylvain pocketed his phone. “At least Dedue was able to convince him to take a day off,” he said with a grave sigh. “I thought he’d chill a little bit with the case in Claude’s hands, but he's obviously not coping well. Maybe we should ask Claude to call him, make it sound like we have really good news.”

“Or maybe I could just drive back to Faerghus and knock some sense in to him,” Felix muttered. “Why did he bother sending us if he was just going to carry on making himself sick with worry? I thought us being here was supposed to ‘calm him down’ or whatever.”

“You know what he’s like. He overthinks everything.”

“He’s an idiot is what he is. Since when did he care so much about this locket anyway? He’s never even told us about his supposed ‘step mother’.”

Sylvain shrugged. “I guess he’d tell us if he thought it was important.”

“We’re literally in the middle of Adrestia, dressing up in ugly clothes and crawling through vents for him. I think we deserve a little more information than ‘_It was a gift and it’s mine_.’”

“Maybe that’s all there is to it and he’s extremely sentimental.” Sylvain tried, but the moment he made eye contact with Felix’s hardened glare, he held up his hands in defeat. “OK, yeah. It does seem a little strange that he hasn’t told us more about it. But I’m sure he has his reasons.”

“Whatever. If something happens because he’s still being stupid after _he_ lectured _me_ about how capable this team was, and how necessary it was to play nice with them, then I’ll kill him.”

Sylvain couldn’t stop the laugh that bubbled up in his chest. “He lectured you about playing nice?”

“What else do you think he pulled me aside for? Fucking hypocrite.”

“I mean he’s not wrong. We could stand to be a little friendlier. You want Lysithea to teach you how to turn your computer in to a weapon, don’t you?”

“Who said that?”

“Uh, you did?”

Felix stopped. Maybe he had been curious as to how Lysithea could make so many threats with just a click of a button, or command such authority at such a young age. It would definitely get people to take him more seriously, and it had shut Sylvain up quicker than Felix had ever been able to get him to _stop fucking talking. _Because no matter how hard he tried to convince himself otherwise, he couldn’t deny that he was in fact, enjoying himself, and that the people around him had such a vast array of skills, he could do little else other than be intrigued.

He wanted to spar with the loud one, and the big muscle guy, and Leonie. He wanted to learn how to hack things, and how to drive as fast as Byleth without getting pulled over.

“Buy them food, then,” he said.

Sylvain’s eyes widened, and then he nudged Felix’s shoulder with a wicked laugh. “Hell yeah! Grab your stuff, we’ll get some food and then go and visit Leonie and Lysithea’s room. I hear a lot of them are doing a surveillance watch together. We can join in.”

“Fine,” he grumbled, trying his hardest not to sound excited.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tysm for reading !!! ur comments literally make my day :((


	11. THE WATCH CONTINUES.

CHAPTER ELEVEN: IGNATZ

THE WATCH CONTINUES

It was hard to concentrate on anything much with two of the loudest members of the team acting as though they were catching up over lunch, rather than looking for a thief amongst the footage. Still, it made the day more bearable to have Leonie and Raphael’s voices acting as background noise while Ignatz worked simultaneously on forging Leonie a new ID, and keeping an eye on the Varley building’s front entrance. It stopped him from either passing out, or getting so consumed by work that he forgot to eat again. Or both.

“I’m getting hungry,” Leonie said, drumming her fingers against the plastic of her laptop. “Should I order something?”

“You should probably ask Claude first, just in case he’s ordering,” Lysithea said without looking up from her screen. She’d long since finished checking the brooch for bugs, deeming it nothing more than a uselessly pretty pile of metal and glass, and had instead focussed her attention on three different areas of the Aegir building to catch up for lost time. Ignatz probably needed to talk to her about overworking herself, but then she would probably only claim that she _could_ be doing a lot more in response, and Ignatz wasn’t exactly a model citizen either when it came to pacing himself.

“Or, we could let him order too and eat both?” Raphael grinned. “I know I have room for it.”

Leonie looked at him for a moment and then shrugged. “Sounds good to me. I’ll phone through our usual pizza order. I think Claude will have my head if we use room service.”

“He’ll have to get in line,” Ignatz said. “I want it first, for making me redo _this._”

“I thought we’d made a promise not to talk about Sandra or Sonia,” Leonie whined. “I thought we were cool, Ignatz.”

Lysithea threw her head back and laughed, “Yeah, Ignatz. That’s really shit of you. We were all moving on.”

Ignatz rolled his eyes and leaned back to stretch out the crick in his neck. “It’s pretty hard to move on when you’ve been forced to stare at Leonie’s ID mugshot all morning,” he mumbled. “But fine. Make mine a veggie pizza.”

“But our usual order doesn’t have a veggie pi—”

“I want a veggie pizza, Leonie.”

Leonie held her hands up in surrender. “OK, fuck. Don’t hurt me. How many do you want? I’ll get you two veggie pizzas if you’ll spare my life.”

“Just the one will do.”

She lowered one hand, reached around until she found her phone and then proceeded to make the call as though being forced to by an interrogator.

“We need to make a breakthrough in this case,” Lysithea sighed, watching Leonie fake tears while keeping her voice professional. “It’s taking its toll on us all.”

It had been a few days now since the start of the case, and already everybody was itching for something concrete. Whether it was because Sylvain and Felix’s presence was putting extra pressure on them to get results, or everybody was had taken more of an interest in the case, Ignatz wasn’t sure. But even he was willing something strange to walk in to the Varley building.

“Espionage will be fun,” Raphael said. “It’s been a while since I went out in the field. I’ll have to get someone to pick up Maya from school though.”

Ignatz smiled at him. He was such a good older brother, always putting Maya before anything else. Even with such a hectic and unpredictable job, he still managed to find the time to give her everything he had, and make sure she was properly taken care of. If Ignatz could drive, he’d offer to make the four hour journey himself, but as it stood, not a single one of them had the time to spare. “I’m sure Byleth will help out if Claude doesn’t need them for anything.”

“You think? That would be great, Maya’s really interested in Jeritza for some reason.”

“She have a crush on him or something?” Lysithea laughed. “Poor kid.”

Raphael hummed. “No, not exactly. She seems to have it in her head that he’s a serial killer. She likes to look in to cold cases and interview him as if she’s the chief of police. You know, kid stuff.”

“Yeah, classic kid stuff,” Lysithea mocked.

Leonie, however, choked on air. “You’re raising a little wannabe SIO? Next time I see her we’re going to have to have a little talk.”

“I encourage her no matter what path in life she wants to take,” Raphael said. “Except, obviously, serial killing.”

“Which is precisely what he _should_ be doing,” Ignatz added before Leonie could say anything else. He turned to her, arms crossed over his chest. “What? You’re going to crush a kid’s dreams just because she wants to grow up to become our sworn enemy?”

“I mean technically, we don’t murder people, so she wouldn’t even be _our _enemy,” Lysithea added.

“Doesn’t matter,” Leonie said and turned away, sticking her chin up in the air. “Besides, I was just going to gently persuade her towards a different vocation, that’s all. Something like, I don’t know, art.”

Ignatz smirked. “What, so you can secretly run to another forger when you murder another ID?_”_

“_No_,” she said with exaggerated flair. “You guys are so mean, all you ever—”

A knock at the door cut her off before she could wax poetic about how the team was villainising her again and they didn’t deserve her or her talents. A godsend, really, considering they’d already had the conversation a few times already this month.

“I’ll get it,” Leonie offered. Her smile soon turned wicked as she approached the door and turned over her shoulder to say, “It’s probably Claude asking us about food. Raph, you’re such a genius.”

What nobody expected, however, was for Sylvain and Felix to be on the other side of the door, carrying two large bags of takeout.

“A peace offering,” Sylvain beamed, holding up the bags. “Thought you all might be hungry. You haven’t ordered anything yet, have you?”

Everybody exchanged a look, and Ignatz opened his mouth to inform them that they’d already ordered pizza, but Lysithea promptly cut him off before he could speak. It was probably morally wrong to leech two orders of takeout from the rest of the team when they’d already ordered their own, but Ignatz only really felt bad about duping Claude. “No, we’ve been way too busy,” she said with a sad shake of her head and a thickly sweet affection to her voice.

Leonie ushered them inside, and when they turned their backs on her she pumped the air in a silent cheer. “It’s so kind of you to bring us food. Maybe I won’t hack your phone after all.”

“You were going to?” Sylvain asked, concern hidden beneath his laugh. He piled the bags on the floor next to the coffee table and Ignatz put his laptop down to help clear some space, his stomach growling as the smell of warm food wafted from the packaging.

“Definitely,” Lysithea said. “After what you put me through yesterday, I _was_ going to swap all of your contact names and change your password.”

Sylvain looked seriously affronted. Once this case was over, Ignatz was going to have to get a copy of the Aegir building infiltration recording. It sounded like an absolute riot. “What the—I seriously thought we’d bonded yesterday!” he said, pulling paper plates out from one of the bags. “You were really going to do that?”

“Yes, but you’ve redeemed yourself now. Food is always the answer. What did you buy?”

“A bit of everything,” Sylvain said, unloading some of the bags. “We didn’t know what you guys liked and I don’t have any of your numbers. Well, except Claude’s.”

“Speaking of numbers, how did Claude get mine?” Felix asked. “I don’t remember giving it out.”

A quiet symphony of knowing laughs erupted, above which Lysithea said with a flourish of her hand, “I got it for him.”

With Lysithea, Linhardt, and Ignatz in tow, Claude had access to pretty much any and all of the sensitive information he could ever need. Getting Felix’s number was just the tip of an extremely deep running iceberg.

Felix frowned. A familiar look, apparently, considering Ignatz had only seen his face perform indifferent and angry. “How?” he demanded.

“That’s classified information, knight boy,” Leonie grinned at the same time Lysithea said, “Magic.”

Ignatz raised an inquisitive eyebrow. “Knight boy?”

“He’s a nerd like you, Ig,” Leonie said, a twinkle in her eye as she took in Felix’s darkening expression. “He used to LARP.”

“You used to _LARP_?” Ignatz asked. Now _that_ was a surprise. Felix didn’t exactly look the type to enjoy such things, but then neither did Raphael, and he’d joined their team and enjoyed it just as much as anyone else.

“Do you have a problem with that, four eyes?” Felix leaned forward and Sylvain’s smile almost looked hysteric as he put a hand on Felix’s shoulder and squeezed. Even from his distance, Ignatz could tell it wasn’t so much a friendly, encouraging squeeze as it was a warning.

“Woah,” Ignatz held up his hands and shook his head. “No. I LARP too. So do Raph and Caspar. We go once a month. Though I think we’re going to have to reschedule this time.”

Felix leaned back, seemingly satisfied by the answer, and cleared his throat. “Oh. What kind do, uh…”

“Go on,” Sylvain said with an encouraging elbow to the side.

“Shut the fuck up,” Felix snapped and elbowed him back. “What kind do you do?”

“Oh god this is tragic, can we just eat now?” Lysithea groaned.

“Yeah, yeah, here,” Sylvain complied and piled a bit of everything on to a plate for Lysithea. Soon after, everybody took that as a sign to dig in, taking whatever food they fancied from the impromptu buffet, temporarily forgoing the investigation to chat over food. Sylvain ended up talking to Leonie about some girl he knew back home, and Lysithea went right back to working, adding her insight whenever she deemed it necessary.

Raphael took his seat next to Ignatz, shoulders knocking, knees touching, as they joined Felix in divulging their LARP pasts. They learned that like them, Felix used to play a knight with his school friends, and partake in small scale battles on the school field. Uncanny, really, that they’d meet and share such an uncommon interest, and for the first time since he’d arrived, Ignatz managed to get more than two minutes worth of conversation out of Felix without him insulting anybody. He really wasn’t as hostile as he seemed once he began talking about one of his passions. In time, he might even fit in with the team, if he lowered his guard often enough and actually got their names right.

“You really do have a sword collection?” Ignatz found himself asking. Back at their new house, Ignatz had been certain he’d been exaggerating to get one up over Caspar, but now, after learning of Felix’s history with LARP, it didn’t seem so outrageous.

“I started when I was a twelve,” he said. “My old man got me a sword at an antique fair.”

“Your dad got you a _sword_ at the age of twelve?” Raphael asked. “Am I doing something wrong? Should I be getting Maya swords?”

“No, Raph. Twelve-year-olds don’t typically own swords.”

“Oh, thank the Goddess,” he said, throwing one arm around Ignatz’s shoulder in his usual style of casual affection, and attacking a chicken leg with his free hand. Ignatz sent a quick prayer to the goddess in both thanks, and distress. “Thought I was doing something wrong.”

Felix started on pouring some drinks. “Yeah, I mean I guess my dad had some issues. He let my brother start his weapon collection at ten.”

“Almost took one of my arms off with his ‘ancient battle axe’ when we attempted to go dragon hunting in their back garden once,” Sylvain beamed from the other side of the room as though it was something to brag about. “I needed eleven stitches and almost died of gangrene.”

“You didn’t almost die of gangrene,” Felix rolled his eyes. “Stop exaggerating.”

“The doctor said I was _this_ close to losing my arm,” Sylvain said, demonstrating the severity of the situation by holding his thumb and finger millimetre away from each other.

“The doctor said that to make you seem cooler because you were a child.”

“Whatever helps you sleep at night,” Sylvain waved him off. “Glenn wasn’t a qualified axe throwing instructor. I can’t believe you didn’t stop me.”

“Glenn was, and still is an idiot. And so are you. What did you think was going to happen when you threw an ancient, age-blunted axe at a tree? You were lucky it didn’t hit your face.”

“Ha!" Leonie laughed, "and I thought Caspar was—”

The door interrupted Leonie for a second time and silence befell the room. Waiting on the other side was either the pizza order they weren’t supposed to have ordered, or someone with some interesting news. Ignatz hoped for the latter for more than one reason.

Leonie wiped her hands clean on her jeans and went to answer it, sparing Ignatz a dejected glance on her way. Judging by the silence on the other side of the door, the situation wasn’t looking good. They weren’t supposed to dupe people out of food if they were still currently sharing a meal with them. Now they’d be forced to reveal their duplicity and share their pizza. Ignatz sent another quick prayer to the Goddess that neither Felix nor Sylvain liked veggie pizza.

“Oh would you look at that!” Leonie said on her way back in, arms full of stacked pizza boxes. She kicked the door shut behind her and peered over the boxes at Sylvain and Felix, an undoubtedly guilty expression on her face. “Seems as though someone’s gone and ordered us eight pizzas! How kind and selfless.”

“You’d already ordered food, hadn’t you?” Sylvain asked with a playful smile. He didn’t seem _too_ angry, but then Ignatz wasn’t so sure what kind of emotion he could be hiding beneath his permanent mask of politeness. Dungeons and Dragons had sharpened Ignatz's perception enough to know when someone was secretly dangerous.

“No, don’t be stupid we’d never—”

“I told you we should have just asked first,” Felix scoffed.

“Hey now,” Raphael put down his chicken wing and held up his hands between the opposing parties as though parting the sea of arguments. “This is the opposite of a problem. Now we have twice the food! That was what we planned, right?”

Ignatz smacked a hand to his forehead. They weren’t supposed to reveal the fact they’d been _planning_ on leeching extra food, but he supposed the jig was up now.

“I suppose you’re going to want some of our pizza in return?” Leonie asked, hugging the pizza boxes closer to her chest.

“Well yeah,” Sylvain said. “All is fair in food and espionage.”

Nobody could argue with that, and so the pizza boxes were laid out across the floor, all propped open on a first come, first serve basis. But no matter how many of them there were, or how many new additions had been added to the mix, one fact was remained irrefutable: nobody but Ignatz liked veggie pizza.

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

\--LYSITHEA--

Lysithea stared holes in to her laptop screen, willing something to change. She’d always hated this part the most; the waiting. It felt as though she needed to be doing three other things simultaneously to make up for the idleness of sitting around and expecting something to jump out at her. Things were way more interesting when stakes and skill were involved. Luck had never been an advantage of hers, and observing security footage required an abundance of it. She could spend forty-eight hours observing footage, only for someone else to watch five minutes and find something of interest.

Most of the team could only cope observing one screen at a time, but in an effort to increase her odds of finding something first, Lysithea had long since upgraded her levels of concentration. Four video feeds sat in front of her across two open laptops, and she kept her vision dancing over all of them, expertly checking each and every one for the most minor of detail changes. A notebook sat open in her lap, pen poised, ready to jot down timestamps of anything suspicious, but over eight hours had passed already and the page remained blank.

Outside, the evening had crept in, and despite the warm weather, the curtains of her room had long since been drawn closed. The glare upon her laptop screen was almost unbearable in the early summer, and no matter how much Leonie complained about it being too hot, Lysithea refused to budge on the matter, opting instead to lower the air conditioning level until it emulated the temperature of mid-winter.

Sylvain and Felix, despite having to go back to their room to retrieve blankets to cope with the adverse conditions, remained in the room with the rest of the team, and even managed to join in on more than a few conversations as though they were a part of the team, eating the third round of food that Claude ordered for them with smiles as large as everyone else’s.

While Lysithea worked without comment, they all shared stories of their youth, of how they came to be retrieval artists, and security guards respectively. They also learned a considerable amount about Dimitri, having been Felix and Sylvain’s childhood friend, and from what she overheard, Lysithea deemed him well-intentioned, but foolish.

In a way, his work ethic reminded Lysithea of her own – only she had long outgrown the concept of ignoring a helping hand. Claude and the rest of the team had picked her up one too many times after burning out for her to hinder the team’s progress by continuing to incapacitate herself. She knew her own limits intimately well by now, but by the way Felix described Dimitri’s unwillingness to concede and rest, he had yet to discover his own. Maybe this whole locket business would teach him a thing or two about listening to his friends and their well-meant intentions.

The noise levels increased exponentially upon Caspar and Linhardt’s arrival a while later. Wherever Caspar went, he inspired noise – bringing out everybody’s more rowdy side. At this point, it could even be considered a talent.

“Hilda definitely didn’t kick me out this time, we left voluntarily. It’s way more fun down here,” he said.

“More like the sexual tension was suffocating,” Linhardt added with a dejected sigh. “I wish I hadn’t woken up.”

“So, what _is_ the deal with them?” Sylvain asked. “How long have you guys been suffering?”

“Ha!” Leonie scoffed. “You think _this_ is bad, it was even more unbearable when Lorenz first came here. He was _obviously_ crushing on Claude super hard but only ever talked to him using insults. It was like he was angry at Claude for existing and having the audacity to be cute at the same time or something.”

“Yeah, but I’m not sure what’s worse,” Ignatz sighed. “The subtle, badly-concealed pining, or this upgraded, obvious pining with new and improved ‘longing stares’ and ‘flirtatious banter’.”

“They’re both as pathetic as each other,” Lysithea said, still studying all four of her video feeds intensely. “And I’m giving them until the end of the month before I lock them in a room and throw away the key.”

The rest of the team jeered in respect of Lysithea’s plan, but Sylvain just hummed. “That’s fun and all,” he said, “but have you guys actually thought about how annoying it could get if they actually _did _confess their feelings for one another?” When everybody just stared blankly back at him, he continued, “I mean, you think the flirtatious banter is bad now, but I can guarantee that it’ll worsen tenfold once they don’t have a stupid reason holding them back.”

“Why would you say that?” Leonie asked, offended.

“Because we’ve lived through something similar,” Felix said, tone grave.

Lysithea paused two of her video feeds to pay closer attention. It seemed as though their ‘boring’ lives as bodyguards weren’t so dull after all, but actually quite entertaining. This was going to require a bit more of her attention.

“Oh?” Raphael said, tilting his head as he considered them both. “Are you two…?”

“_No,”_ Felix said firmly before Raphael could finish his question.

Sylvain laughed, but it wasn’t his usual carefree laugh; it was sharp and mirthless, and while Lysithea wasn’t officially a detective, it didn’t take one to deduce that _something_ was being left unsaid. “That’s a tale for another day,” he said and paused for a short moment until his smile returned. “I’m talking of the ridiculously sweet, fairy-tale office romance between Dimitri and Dedue.”

"Dimitri and Dedue are a thing?" Lysithea asked, eyes wide. "Wow."

“Yeah," Felix said, voice bordering disgusted. "Dimitri would write him poems. I had to proofread each and every one of them.”

“Oh my god,” Ignatz snorted. “He made you proofread his love poems? Were they good?”

“I don’t fucking know. Probably not? I mean, _Dimitri_ wrote them.”

“Did you get paid extra?” Leonie asked.

“I'm starting to think I should have been.”

Sylvain leaned back in his seat, hands behind his head. “You think that’s bad, he made _me_ take a four-week course in floriculture, so I could teach _him_ floriculture so he could understand Dedue’s secret flower-love-language-messages. Did you know that red tulips are a sign of true love? And blue hyacinths express sincerity? Cool right? At least I learned something along the way.”

Out of nowhere, Felix suddenly choked on air and immediately reached for a paper cup of water under the judgemental eye of everyone present. “Swallowed wrong,” he managed between coughs, his cheeks flushed red. “Carry on.”

Lysithea ignored him and laughed. It seemed as though the bodyguards really did have it bad – maybe the whole Claude-Lorenz situation wasn’t as terrible as they’d been making it out to be. “Why didn’t he just take the course himself?” she asked. “Surely that would have been easier?”

“Probably the same reason Claude and Lorenz keep dancing around each other. Some made up excuse made to prolong everybody’s suffering. But that’s not the worst part – that all came _before_ they sorted their shit out. Once Felix, Ingrid, and I finally got them to talk about their feelings, they wound up even more sickeningly in love. It was like we’d broken the dam and unknowingly released ten years’ worth of repressed romantic tension. I’m talking Dimitri’s office would be completely full of flowers every other day and he’d be close to tears every time he walked in to work.”

Felix clicked his tongue. “Sometimes, they just stand there and stare at each other like I don’t get paid and forced to also stand there and watch them stare at each other. It’s disgusting.”

“Well, what the fuck are we supposed to do now?” Caspar asked sounding genuinely distressed. “I don’t think I can do another job. I was made specifically for this!”

“Caspar, calm down,” Leonie said. “You’re not going to lose your job when Claude and Lorenz start sucking face.”

“Uh, yeah I am, because if I catch them…You know_… At it,_ I’ll have no choice but to leave. I don’t think even my unbelievably shredded body could endure the emotional impact.”

“Seconded,” Lysithea said, putting her hand in the air. “It would be like walking in on your parents.”

The mental image alone was enough to turn Lysithea’s stomach. Watching them flirt was already painful enough.

“Uh-oh,” Sylvain chuckled. “Seems as though I’ve accidentally opened a can of worms. But it’s probably nothing, right? I mean you already have couples within the team.”

“Ah yes,” Linhardt said. “But Caspar and I didn’t sit on our repressed feelings for over six years.”

“Yeah! That’s true! The moment I knew I liked him I blurted it out at a bus stop.”

“How romantic,” Ignatz drawled. “I bet the onlookers were thrilled to hear it.”

“Right? The old lady I give up my seat for every day gave us, like, all the money in her purse and told us to buy something nice together.”

A small smile found its way on to Linhardt’s lips as he reminisced. “He bought me a onesie with an inflatable cushioned hood so I could sleep anywhere without breaking my neck.”

“And Linhardt used the rest of it on the gacha machine I always pass but never have money for! I got like, eighteen capsules. It was the best day of my life.”

“Shouldn’t you have, I don’t know, gone for a romantic meal together or something?” Leonie asked, completely dumbfounded.

Caspar made a face. “What? No! We weren’t going to waste that kind of money on _food_. I had turkey dinosaurs and nuggets waiting in the freezer at home.”

“But eighteen useless gacha capsules isn’t considered a waste?”

“No, it isn’t,” Caspar said, sticking his chin in the air. “And they weren’t useless. I got a cute little pineapple hat for Bucket.”

“That poor old lady thought she was doing something really sweet and selfless, and you ended up wasting her old people money on a pineapple hat for your cat, and a dumb, novelty onesie. I literally hate you,” Lysithea said.

Caspar crossed his arms defensively over his chest. “Oh yeah, and what would you have done with the money? And please don’t say donate it to charity because that’ll make me feel like a total asshole.”

In reality, there were over a thousand different uses Lysithea could think of for being randomly handed cash, but she knew the rest of the team would deem her choices for obscure technology or a dozen sweet cakes just as ridiculous as Caspar’s pineapple hat, and instead settled for a threat. “I would have put it towards my hitman fund, should I ever need to silence one of you.”

“You don’t need to pay someone for that, Lys. I’d do it for you free of charge,” Raphael said with a worryingly sincere smile.

Everybody stopped what they were doing and wearily looked at Raphael, unsure of whether or not he was joking. Not even Lysithea could tell, but she smiled back nevertheless, a new air of smugness apparent in her posture. The battle for Raphael’s favouritism was always hard fought, but Lysithea usually came out on top.

“Aw thanks, Raph. Then I guess I’ll spend the money I have saved up on a bakery or something.”

Leonie paled. “Wait, a _bakery? _Like a _whole_ bakery? How much did you have in your hitman fund?”

Lysithea did the calculations in her head and then hummed. “Enough to cover at least six of you.”

Truthfully, Lysithea’s large pool of savings came from before she had fully recovered from her illness. It was a fund amassed using her immense hacking skills, meant to cover any inconveniences should she have passed, but after finally getting the all-clear, she now had an extremely large sum of money just sitting and waiting for someone to dip in to it. But for years now it remained hidden, lurking as an insurance policy should anything happen to the team, because if Lysithea had learned anything in this line of work, it was that secret stashes of cash were extremely handy. _Especially_ when at least two of her friends got arrested on a monthly basis.

“Does Claude know you have money ready to kill us all with?” Linhardt asked, not at all sounding concerned.

“Who do you think gave me the number?” Lysithea grinned.

Although there was no hitman, nor a hitman fund, watching her friend’s faces contort in to various degrees of concerned gave Lysithea an immense sense of satisfaction. Maybe this meant that they would actually start to take her threats a bit more seriously again. Felix and Sylvain, being the newbies, hadn’t gotten used to her prickly nature as of yet, but the rest of the team were well equipped to deal with her technology-based warfare by now. Linhardt acted as a doctor of sorts, fixing everybody’s technology - for a price of course – and she’d been forced to consider creating new methods. Maybe she should have revealed her monetary secrets earlier. Then maybe she wouldn’t have had to sacrifice one of her own laptops in creating a vicious virus to destroy one of Ignatz’s from the inside out.

“You all seriously scare me,” Sylvain said. “Especially you, Your Esteemed Noble Highness.” He bowed his head at Lysithea with a small flourish of his hand and Lysithea grinned.

“See, that’s the level of respect I expect to see from you all,” she said with a pointed look in Leonie’s direction.

“Over my dead—” Leonie suddenly caught herself midway through the sentence and spared a quick glance at Raphael. “Of course, My Lady,” she corrected herself, sounding like a member of a pompous, noble family.

“Alright, now I have some kind of authority, please shut the fuck up so I can get back to work. Have you all forgotten that we’re supposed to be looking for a thief?”

“Ah yeah, that thing,” Caspar groaned and slumped back in his seat. After a few quiet moments in which he shuffled around and apologised for elbowing Linhardt’s laptop for the third time, he spoke up again, “Damn, I hate this part. It’s so boring. Can someone please find something already?”

“Maybe one of us would have if we’d actually been looking,” Lysithea reminded him. Honestly, sometimes it was like working with children. Actually, that was wrong; children probably would have displayed significantly more obedience and actually done the work they were supposed to do.

To demonstrate her unwillingness to partake in any more distracting talk, Lysithea pulled on her headphones and resumed her search for something out of the ordinary. Following her lead, it seemed, the rest of the room was finally ready to close their mouths and start searching in earnest too.

Hours painstakingly melted away, and those present in her room soon dwindled to just herself and Leonie again as everybody returned to their own rooms for comfort and naps. Lysithea eyed the clock on her laptop as it turned over the hour to three in the morning with nothing to show for it and groaned, throwing off her headphones again.

“Anything?” she asked Leonie, rubbing at her sore ears.

With no reply, Lysithea looked over to Leonie’s side of the room to find her fast asleep right next to her open laptop. The screen had long since fallen asleep beside its owner, but Lysithea didn’t have the heart to wake either of them up. They’d been awake searching since early in the morning after all, and not everybody was able to endure in to the early morning hours like Lysithea.

She got up soundlessly, grabbed some snacks from the bag Raphael had bought her, and then started brewing some fruit tea. The night was still young after all, and she was determined to be the first to find something useful.

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

\--LORENZ--

“Claude, would you _please_ turn that off and get some sleep?”

Lorenz was artfully ignored, and the relentless tapping of keyboard keys continued. As did the dancing of screen light over Claude’s face as he leaned in to get a closer look.

“I don’t particularly fancy dealing with your grouchy self come the morning when you realise Hilda has drunk all of our coffee. So please. Get some sleep while it’s still dark.”

“No point,” Claude said simply, chewing on the end of a pen. “I’d only lie there and think anyway.”

Lorenz sighed and sat up in his bed. Even with the distance between the two, the tapping and clicking and shuffling was too much for a delicate sleeper such as Lorenz to catch so much as a wink more of sleep. At least he’d managed to squeeze in a few hours of rest before waking.

“And you have the audacity to lecture the tech team on their awful sleeping habits,” Lorenz said with a disapproving click of his tongue. “You’re going to ruin your neck if you continue to slouch in such an awful position.”

Claude straightened some, but was still hunched ungracefully over his work. Lorenz took that as a sign that he wouldn’t be listening to his advice any time soon and gave up, switching on the bedside lamp in defeat.

“Maybe you should come and straighten me out properly,” Claude said without looking away from his screen. His voice lacked both tone and inflection and the only way Lorenz could tell that he was teasing, was by the small smile tugging at the corner of his lips.

“I’ve half a mind to,” Lorenz drawled. “It’s me who will have to listen to your complaints for the rest of the week after all.”

“Hmm, it’s fine. You can just give a massage later.”

“I’ll do nothing of the sort.”

Claude actually looked up from his laptop then, and sent Lorenz a cheeky smile. Despite having been up since early hours of the morning, and not catching much sleep the night before, he still somehow managed to look his usual charming self. “That’s exactly what you said last time, remember?”

Lorenz huffed and retrieved his own laptop from the bedside table drawer. How could he forget? The hooligans Lorenz called teammates had hounded him for days after rushing to Claude’s aid when he called ‘cramp!’ during a high stake mission. Lorenz had warned him about his horrendous posture in the car, but he hadn’t listened then and he very clearly wasn’t listening now. But knowing himself, Lorenz would end up doing exactly as Claude wanted anyway, falling head first in to his scheme to get a free massage. At least this time they had a hotel room of their own to keep the matter private.

“I’ll assume you’ve found nothing of interest,” Lorenz said, safely diverting the conversation before it inevitably ended up crashing in to something awkward. “Since you’ve not woken us all with a megaphone.”

“No,” Claude said with a sigh. “Nothing yet. I don’t think we _will_ find anything in the Aegir building. It’s not like they’re going to walk through the front doors wearing the damn thing.”

“I don’t know,” Lorenz said, stifling a yawn. “Stranger things have happened.”

“Not this time. I don’t even know where to look. Sometimes I feel like I’m focussing too heavily on Ferdinand Aegir, and maybe he’s just as much in the dark as we are. Other times I think maybe all three buildings are unaware too, and we’re all getting played by a third party.”

“OK, let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Lorenz said before Claude could veer off course any further. It didn’t do well to drown oneself so early on, and Claude was an expert at sticking his fingers into way too many pies at once. Most of the time it got the case solved, but this case required precision. “Don’t forget, we still have the Hresvelg building to survey. I’ll wager most of the answers you seek will be extracted from there.”

“Yeah, I know. You’re right. I’m just—”

“Impatient?”

“I was going to say eager, but that works too.” Claude paused for a moment, as though pondering something in silence, and then continued quietly, “You know, it’s a good thing I have you here with me. You keep me grounded. Hilda would have started a whole spiel about it being a conspiracy and then where would I be?”

“In prison and on the most-wanted list for _unearthing_ the ridiculous conspiracy theory most likely,” Lorenz scoffed.

“And you’d be infiltrating the prison trying to break us back out, right?”

“Absolutely not. I’d be content at home with my feet up, raising a congratulatory glass of wine, finally glad to be rid of the lot of you.”

Claude leaned back against the headboard and Lorenz tried not to look at him, focussing instead on the newly loaded Aegir building footage flickering on the screen before him. “You can’t fool me, Lorenz,” he said, the smile evident in his voice. “I know you care about this team more than anyone else.”

Unspoken was the irrefutable fact that Lorenz not only cared for the team, but had found family within it. More so than the one headed by his own father. And possibly even more remarkable was the resulting companionship he and Claude had forged. Nobody else was able to banter so effortlessly with him, to work so seamlessly alongside him, and understand him so deeply. Since that fateful morning Lorenz decided to swallow his pride and knock on Claude’s door, they had grown and improved as people together, finely tuned themselves to match harmoniously, and Lorenz, no matter how much he complained, cherished and treasured every moment.

“Ah yes,” Lorenz said as though all of his secrets had been unveiled. “That small detail.”

Claude laughed. “You really are my favourite, you know that?”

“How many times must I warn you against baseless flattery?”

“It’s not flattery this time. I mean it, Lorenz.”

For a moment, Lorenz thought the conversation might turn serious. That the very obvious discussion of their feelings towards one another might finally stop looming over their heads and take centre stage. But that was not the case, and Lorenz was certainly not going to push the matter any further. From the moment he had realised his own feelings, Lorenz had vowed to let Claude take the lead in anything that would happen from that moment on, lest he put his own foot in his mouth and ruin their friendship altogether. The only problem with that was, Claude seemed every bit as stubborn on the matter as Lorenz, no matter how obvious he had become in his displays of flirtation. Of course another blaringly obvious problem was that it was nearing four in the morning during an incredibly boring and fruitless surveillance watch – hardly the time for unpacking years of unspoken sentiment.

“Hm, in that case, I don’t think you need me to tell you that out of the circus we call a team, you are arguably the most tolerable of the bunch. Discounting Marianne, of course.”

“Of course,” Claude agreed with a chuckle. “Wow, you certainly know how to make a guy feel special.”

This time it was Lorenz’s turn to laugh. “I have been told that compliments are a talent of mine. They’re also rare, so treasure them while you can.”

“I’m still holding on dearly to ‘life without you would be ever so dull,’” Claude grinned. “You’ve yet to beat that in terms of sheer poeticism.”

Lorenz felt his cheeks heat slightly at the reminder. Did he really say it like that? So proper and stiff? In his head it had sounded monumentally more romantic. But then, he must have – Claude’s memory was impeccable after all.

“Ah, that must have been some of my earlier work,” Lorenz said, feigning innocence with a wave of his hand. “Sounds quite juvenile. Solve the case and I’ll write you a significantly more realised sonnet.”

“I’ll hold you to that,” Claude immediately. “Looks like you’re gonna have lots of time to come up with some material too - I’m almost caught up with footage and I haven’t found anything yet.”

Lorenz frowned and then glanced down at his own screen, still a few days away from catching up himself. “You’re almost caught up already? Claude, you really ought to get some rest. This cannot be good for your health.”

“It’s fine. There’s too much coffee in my bloodstream for me to care right now. Also, I’ve fast-forwarded through a lot of the footage. It’s just empty corridors for the most part.”

Lorenz clicked his tongue in annoyance. One day he’d finally manage to get through to the team about their awful coffee consuming habits too. Maybe then he’d finally find peace. “That does nothing to ease my concern for your health whatsoever. You really should—”

“Wait!” Claude suddenly sat up straight and fumbled around the bed until he found his notebook.

“What?”

He didn’t respond for a while in favour of writing a timestamp for whatever it was that he’d found, but when he was done, he looked up, pointed at the screen and said, “Hubert!”

“What about Hubert? You said he frequents Mr. Aegir’s office. What’s different this time?”

“He’s—wait a second. I need Lysithea to clarify something.”

“_Lysithea_ is awake too? I thought we’d come to an agreement,” Lorenz huffed and leaned back in a sulk. Three o’clock was meant to be her curfew, but so much for that. Lorenz hadn't really expected her to adhere to but, but here Claude was, practically _encouraging_ her to break it.

A few moments later, and Lysithea was calling Claude back rather than answering through text, the ringtone shrill and piercing in the otherwise silent hotel room. That could only mean some kind of breakthrough.

“Is it the same?” Claude asked the phone, eyes wide in excitement, twinkling on the brink of discovery. “Alright, alright, I’m waiting. Why did you call me if you hadn’t even—OK! OK! I’ll stop talking just, hurry.”

A few minutes passed in which Lorenz raised a quizzical eyebrow at Claude and only received a grin in response. It seemed as though he wouldn’t get any information on the discovery until Claude was absolutely certain about whatever it was he had found, but Lorenz couldn’t help but feel desperate to know already.

Claude shuffled up on to his knees and leaned forward, face mere inches from the laptop screen. “I thought you’d upgraded your laptops to be like super powered or whatever, why is it taking so long? _Wow,_ OK that was uncalled for, is that any way to speak to your dad? OK, I’ll take it back, please don’t actually do that.”

Another few minutes of Claude’s rambling later, and Lorenz watched as his eyebrows shot up and a smile grew in place of the anxious frown. “It is?” he asked and then laughed almost manically. “Perfect, get Caspar to wake Linhardt up. He’s the one covering that area of the Varley building. No, I don’t particularly care for _how_ you wake them up, just don’t wake up the rest of the hotel. OK, good. Once they’re awake, send them here.”

He put the phone down and then snapped his fingers. “Looks like we’ve got something. Look here,” he said, beckoning Lorenz over to his side of the room. Begrudgingly he left the comfort of his bed, and the air-conditioned coldness of the room sent a chill over his skin along the way. 

As soon as he got close enough, Claude pointed to his screen. “This is Hubert, coming back to Ferdinand Aegir’s office the afternoon of our infiltrations, just before Sylvain and I got there. Look what he’s carrying.”

When Lorenz crouched down close enough to see, his attention was immediately drawn to a man clad in black, walking along an otherwise empty Aegir building corridor. In his hand was a laptop – the front face of it covered in all sorts of cute stickers, very obviously clashing with his carefully cultivated aesthetic. “You think it’s the one Caspar saw in the Varley building?”

“Not just think, my dear Lorenz. I _know_ it is. Lysithea just confirmed it by looking back over Caspar’s chest camera footage. The exact same stickers and everything. Looks like we’ve got a direct connection between all three buildings now, and Hubert, Ferdinand, and someone else from Varley are all definitely involved.” 

“Seems as though things are getting interesting,” Lorenz smiled, gaze wandering from the screen to Claude’s face. Claude was already looking at him, beaming.

“They are indeed,” he said.

“No chance of you possibly catching a nap once you’ve clarified things with Linhardt?” Lorenz tried, noting that up close, Claude’s eyes were slightly bloodshot.

He shook his head. “Absolutely not, I feel like my brain is about to explode.”

“I feared you’d say that,” Lorenz sighed. “Very well. I’ll brew us some tea.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i need to heed lorenz's advice. i actually gave myself a bad neck writing this chapter because of my bad posture. listen to lorenz pls everyone :(
> 
> also pls come say hi to me on twitter !! @/berriesmangoes
> 
> also glenn is alive in this fic because i said so


	12. CLOSING THE GAP

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i wrote this while sick so if something doesnt make sense please be a champion and ignore it tysm lmao

CHAPTER TWELVE: CLAUDE

CLOSING THE GAP

“Hand it over then,” Hilda said, palm open and waiting for Claude to drop something in to it. When Claude only raised an eyebrow at her in response, she continued, “You must have found the locket if you deemed this meeting important enough to wake me up, so come on. Hand it over, let’s see what all this fuss is about.”

“We’re still waiting on Raph and the newbies,” Lysithea said. She looked as tired as Claude felt, but then everybody looked like death walking. Well, everybody except Caspar. Come to think of it, Claude wasn’t sure if he’d ever actually seen him look tired.

“I say we just start without them,” Caspar said. “They’ll catch up eventually.”

“No,” Claude said. “I want everyone here for this.”

They waited another ten minutes before everybody was finally assembled in Claude and Lorenz’s room. Raphael had been out for a ridiculously early morning run and hadn’t heard the text, but Felix and Sylvain’s excuse was more likely that they’d slept through the barrage of calls, judging by their puffy, sleep addled faces.

“What’s this about?” Sylvain asked, voice groggy as he ran a hand through his wild shock of bed hair. “Did you find something?”

“You could say that,” Claude ginned. “Lys, show them the screen.”

Lysithea turned her laptop around and the whole team circled it to get a closer look. In the wait for everybody to assemble, Lysithea had whipped up a short slideshow to present their combined findings and Claude could tell the exact moment they saw the Hubert-laptop-comparison slide by the shocked looks on their faces.

“So Hubert, Ferdinand, and someone in Varley are all involved,” Marianne said after a beat. “I can’t say we saw anyone immediately suspicious, but now I’m second guessing everyone.”

“I’ll bet my savings that the recluse owner is the one behind the laptop,” Hilda said. “Dorothea was way too busy running the place to also be listening in on Dimitri’s office. But Bernadetta Varley hasn’t made a public appearance in like, a year.”

“I’ll admit,” Claude said. “That is a perfectly sound cover, but I’ve also done some digging of my own tonight. Turns out, that when Edelgard got married to someone in Varley over a year ago, it wasn’t just _anyone_. It was Dorothea.”

Caspar clapped his hands together and made an awed sound. “The plot thickens!” he grinned. “Any more cool facts you want to throw out, boss? Any secret relations? Long lost siblings? Ooh! Maybe some estranged twins that we can reunite - like an episode of a reality show!”

“Unfortunately not, Caspar,” Claude laughed. “Just the one marriage.” He turned to Hilda. “You could still be right in assuming Bernadetta is the one behind the laptop, but we can’t dismiss the fact that Dorothea has a direct link to Hresvelg too, _and_ she has a large say in how the company is run.”

“You’re right,” Marianne agreed. “Dorothea said that Bernadetta tried to make her co-manager, but she refused. Maybe there’s more to that than they’re letting on.”

Claude hummed and surveyed the faces of his team. Most of them were attempting to fall back asleep standing up, but he couldn’t send them back to bed when his mind was working overtime. There was so much to do – they needed to start doing more research in to each and every player they’d now identified, the undercover team needed to prepare for their interviews, the tech team needed to ready their equipment ready for their security guard infiltration, the footage still needed to be monitored for any further strange occurrences, and Claude needed to plot this all out on paper before he got tangled up in his own theories.

“OK, so next, we’re—”

“A nap, is what everyone needs right now,” Lorenz said before Claude could finish his sentence. “I don’t think anyone can do much of anything when their eyes are falling out of their heads. Look at poor Leonie,” he said, gesturing to where Leonie was wavering on her feet, eyes flickering between open and closed. “Just a few hours rest and everyone will be ready to fight the day. We might even get a response from Hresvelg’s recruitment team in the meanwhile.”

Claude wanted to argue, but another look from Lorenz told him that maybe he needed to heed his advice on this one. Leonie _did_ look alarmingly as though she might fall atop Ignatz and start a catastrophic game of human dominos.

“Fine, set your alarms for eight and meet back here then,” he said, already setting a reminder on his own phone as he gave the command. “Techs, bring every device you own, and everyone else bring your laptops. We’ve got some serious digging to do.”

To the sound of the world’s most unenthusiastic ‘yes boss,’ the team filed out of the room and returned to their own. Claude was still buzzing with adrenalin even after the room returned to its still quietness and he was about to grab for a pen and paper when suddenly, Lorenz was dragging him towards his bed with more force than Claude thought he possessed. He couldn’t so much as voice a feeble protest before he was forced to sit on the mattress.

“Sleep,” Lorenz ordered. “You’ll be of no use come the morning if your brain won’t allow you to so much as string a sentence together.”

“Sleep is for the weak, Lorenz, just brew me another mug of that tea.” Claude waved him off and tried to break out of his grip, but Lorenz just pushed him down on to the bed and held him by his shoulders.

“Don’t make me tie you down, Riegan.”

“Ooh,” Claude grinned, “spicy.”

“Oh yes,” Lorenz scoffed, but Claude felt his grip falter slightly. “How utterly romantic it is that I am forced to worry over you like a mother would a stubborn child.”

Claude hummed but obeyed, and climbed beneath the sheets. “Would you rather I fawn over our domesticity instead?”

Lorenz seemed satisfied with Claude’s compliance, and climbed in to his own bed before snapping the light off. “I’d rather you shut your smart mouth for more than ten minutes so we can both actually get some sleep.”

Now was as good a time as any to push his luck. “Hmm, maybe I’d be more inclined to sleep if you came over here and joined me.”

Claude couldn’t see Lorenz’s face in the darkness, but he could hear the blush in his voice in the way that he slightly faltered before answering. “Maybe you’d be more inclined to sleep if I used one of your tranquilisers on you."

“Very well, I guess you win this round,” Claude sighed. He'd used the tranquiliser on Caspar once before - he'd passed out for almost a whole day. The very thought of being inactive for so long made Claude shudder. “I promise I won’t pretend to sleep either. One hundred percent, genuine sleep, just for you. And your promise not to tranquilise me.”

“You’d better not pretend. You forget that I can tell the difference. Out of all these idiots I arguably know you the best.”

Claude wanted to say that there was no reason to argue the fact – it was irrefutable. Lorenz had spent more time with Claude over the last few years than Claude had with his own family. Instead he just laughed. “Of course. There’s no getting passed you. Look, I’m relaxing diligently as we speak.”

“I can’t see anything, Claude. It’s dark.”

“Then you’ll have to take my word for it.”

“Again, it’s hard to trust that attempts are being made when you’re still refusing to close your mouth.”

“I know of another way you could get me to close my—”

“_Claude._”

“Yeah, yeah. OK. Falling asleep now. Gotcha.”

Before long, Claude found that he was, actually, extremely tired, and the relief of finding something significant breathed in to him a huge sigh of relief, and released the tension that had collected in his neck and shoulders. Listening to Lorenz breathe peacefully over the other side of the room, Claude eventually fell in to a dreamless sleep of his own.

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

When Claude woke to the sound of his alarm blaring in his ear, he felt worse than he probably would have had he spent the entire night awake. His eyes didn’t seem to want to open, and couldn’t for more than a few seconds at a time without burning and scrunching themselves closed again. Lorenz was already up, and to Claude’s dismay, had opened the curtains to let floods of blinding sunlight in through the windows.

“Five more minutes,” Claude grumbled, dragging the sheets over his head.

“This was your bright idea,” Lorenz reminded him from his seat at the desk. He’d already showered, made himself breakfast and was currently reading the morning newspaper with one leg crossed over the other. “I’m sure the rest of the team would be more than happy to receive a call letting them know they can go back to bed.”

Claude considered that option for a moment, and then remembered the reason he was waking up and suddenly felt motivated again. He threw the covers off and grabbed for his phone, scrolling through the dozens of emails he’d received in the time he’d been asleep, and surely enough, the three emails he’d been waiting for were sitting unread in his inbox, forwarded automatically by Ignatz’s genius.

“Operation espionage is a go,” Claude said aloud. “All three of them got interviews.”

“In that case, I suppose we’d better look in to renting somewhere closer to Hresvelg,” Lorenz said, blowing cool air on to his steaming cup of tea. “I’ll be choosing this time. We may be using Dimitri’s money for our lodgings, but that’s no reason to drain the poor man dry.”

“Why not? It’s not like he’ll notice the difference,” Claude scoffed. Dimitri’s empire was large enough that he probably used notes higher than Claude could count to wipe his royal ass. It was no water off of Claude’s back to put it to better use pampering and treating his family.

“Decorum, Claude. Manners.”

“That’s adorable,” Claude said. “In that case, you can be the one to inform Hilda of our extreme downgrade.”

Lorenz paused, cup halfway to his mouth, and then settled it back down on the desk. “On second thoughts, I’m sure I saw something online about a five-star hotel a few minutes from the Hresvelg building."

“Uh-huh, that’s what I thought. We’ll wait until we get the all clear before packing everything up. Shouldn’t be here for more than two more days.”

Lorenz agreed, but started looking up nearby hotels on his phone regardless as they waited for the team to congregate. Claude wasn’t sure how many of them had actually been conscious enough to retain his instructions, but even if only half of them showed up, that meant more than enough brains to put to work on the case.

Really, all they could do now was wait for their espionage team to get inside the Hresvelg building and start collecting secrets, but Claude knew better than to just sit around idly, waiting to be handed information. The best plans were formed when the foundations upon which they were built were strong.

Predictably, Lysithea was the first to show up. Without a strict Lorenz to tell her otherwise, she obviously hadn’t slept a wink, and dark circles lined her bloodshot eyes. She did manage to procure herself some tea and what looked to be a box of cake before coming, however, and she’d dragged Leonie along with her. Leonie was much more awake than she had been a few hours previous – she wasn’t swaying anymore, and was now capable of human speech.

“I’m not going to lie to you, Claude, I have no idea what happened last night,” she said, taking a seat on the edge of his bed. “I thought it was some kind of weird dream, so you’re gonna have to catch me up again.”

Leonie wouldn’t be the first to say such a thing this morning, Claude was well aware, so he waved her off and said he’d re-brief everyone before they began work for the day. He did, however, show her one of the emails he’d gotten from Hresvelg, detailing the dates and times of the undercover team’s interviews.

“Nine? That’s so _early,_” she whined. “My body doesn't even properly wake up until eleven. You can’t blame me if I bomb this.”

“Yes, I absolutely can,” Claude laughed. “I’m counting on you to start discourse amongst the staff. Make everyone angry.”

“_That_, I can do. But getting there’s the problem. You know how sweaty I get during interviews. I can punch stuff just fine but talking to snooty rich people unnerves me.”

“But you talk to Lorenz all the time,” Lysithea said. Leonie scoffed, but still didn’t seem convinced. “If you want, I’ll coach you through the interview in your ear. Not that it’ll matter anyway, they’re so desperate for staff they’ll probably see that you’re a living, breathing person and accept you right away.”

Claude studied her as she nervously wrung out her hands, expression amused at the abrupt change in confidence. “I’m going to need you to spend the day familiarising yourself with your new life. I want your story airtight – we don’t know who we’re dealing with here, and if they suspect even something remotely off with you, this whole plan could go to shit.”

“Hey it’s Caspar you should be on to about maintaining story,” Leonie said. “His brain is like a sieve that only retains useless information.”

“Rude,” Caspar said as he walked through the door. “You know, your voice is like a foghorn. I could hear it all the way down the hall.” He made a few demonstrative noises, wailing like a police car siren and Lorenz groaned and pinched the bridge of his nose.

Leonie made a face. “Like you can talk. It’s a mystery that the Flame Emperor hasn’t heard you all the way from whatever weird little lair they live in by now. I’m surprised someone hasn’t issued a noise complaint.”

“Good luck ever getting Linhardt to stop your phone from screaming,” Caspar sneered, unable to counter comments on his own noise level without lying through his teeth. “I’ll make sure it haunts you forever.”

Leonie’s smile was vicious. “Nice try, pipsqueak, but Lysithea already fixed it.”

Caspar looked to her as though she'd just committed the greatest betrayal of all time. Lysithea held up her hands. “I’m not going to apologise for getting involved. It was either that or smash her phone to pieces, and she’s going to need it soon. Also, _some_ of us were trying to work without hearing periodic screams every twelve minutes.”

Linhardt just shrugged when Caspar turned to him desperately for backup. “I’ll think of something else,” he said. “Until the epoxy adhesive marks disappear from my ass, Leonie _will_ suffer.”

“What if it’s permanent damage?” Leonie asked, looking a little worried.

“Then you’ll be looking over your shoulder in to your old age,” Linhardt drawled. “Your phone is the least of your worries.”

The rest of the team filtered in slowly, and it was nearing nine before Claude counted and found that everyone was present. It took five minutes to re-brief everyone. It seemed as though the information had, in fact, sunk in, but needed provocation for people to remember it.

“Espionage team, you’ll be doing nothing but getting in to character. You will eat, sleep, and breathe the life of a security guard. I know you’ve done this before, but if the newbies have any tips, feel free to pass them on. This is going to be a bit longer than the usual two-day gig.”

Raphael, Leonie, and Caspar all agreed, and took their new files from Ignatz. He’d been holding on to them for a while in preparation for another case like this. “If you have any questions about any of it, just ask,” he said. “I know you better than you know yourselves.”

Leonie scoffed as she read through the file. “Why can’t we just send you? You’re obviously better prepared.”

“Because if somebody started shouting at me and pushing me around I’d probably cry,” Ignatz said matter-of-factly. “Also I’m needed behind the computer, not inside it.”

“Fair enough,” Caspar shrugged.

“Moving on,” Claude said, taking control of the room once again. “Sylvain, Felix, Marianne, Hilda: you’ll be trawling the internet for anything you can find on our big three. I don’t care how insignificant it sounds, you’ll each pick a person and compile a file of anything and everything you find. I don’t care if it’s something as dumb as them live-tweeting the cooking of a microwave meal, I want _everything_. Once you’re done with that, you’ll move on to the buildings and document everything on those too. I’m talking news articles, social media posts, advertising campaigns – it’s all relevant. There has to be some kind of motive behind this theft, and if Dimitri’s unsure of it, then maybe we’ll be able to spot it if we look hard enough.”

“Sounds like a lot of work,” Hilda grumbled.

Claude smiled innocently. “I could give you more?”

“No that’s fine,” Hilda said then turned to her new research buddies. “Bugsy Varley building. It’s the smallest.”

Felix huffed like he couldn’t care less, and Sylvain just offered Claude an agreeable salute.

“Tech team, you’ll be preparing all of your equipment ready to wire up the undercover team. I need everything working by tomorrow, six a.m at the latest. It's a few hours to Hresvelg.”

“Easy,” Lysithea said.

“Good. Because as soon as the interviews are over, you’ll be packing it all back up to move to our new base of operations.”

This time it was Linhardt’s turn to groan. “But we just got here.”

“Believe me, I want to leave this place about as much as the rest of you,” Claude said with a sweeping appreciation of the room’s décor and expensive amenities. “But we have to move somewhere closer to Hresvelg or we’ll run ourselves in to the ground with petrol costs. Which reminds me, Raph, I’ve sent Maya’s schedule over to Byleth and Jeritza. They’re free for the next two weeks to pick her up and babysit her. Byleth said they’ve even set up a little murder mystery welcome party at home.”

Raphael beamed and gave Claude a double thumbs up. “Thanks a bunch, boss.”

“So if that’s all the rest of us sorted, what exactly are you two going to be doing?” Hilda asked, narrowing her eyes at Lorenz and Claude. “I didn’t hear your names amongst those slaving away over laptop screens.”

Lorenz arched a brow at Claude, asking the very same question.

“Lorenz and I are going on a little museum date in Hresvelg.”

“You’re _what?”_

“Yes. Do enlighten me, Claude,” Lorenz said, crossing his arms over his chest.

“You heard me. Dress up nice, Lorenz. We’re going sightseeing.”

Hilda scowled. “Are you _kidding_ me? We’ll be here, busting nuts over walls of Wikipedia text and you’ll be off traipsing around Hresvelg on a stupid little geek date? Couldn’t you have waited until we got back home where it’s boring and I don’t care before you started to explore your new, whatever-the-fuck-this-is-relationship?”

Lorenz cleared his throat, and Claude knew he was about to start tripping over himself to deny any such involvement in a 'relationship', so he stepped in. “I want to get a feel for the place,” he said. “See if the locket has any relation or link to Adrestian history or fashion. The Flame Emperor was insistent that it didn’t belong with Dimitri in Faerghus, so maybe it holds some significance here. I need Lorenz because he knows culture and art.”

“But we don’t even know what the locket looks like,” Linhardt reminded him.

“Already covered. Dimitri had some professional shots of it taken a few months back – he sent them over this morning.”

“This is so not fair,” Hilda whined again. “Take me instead, I love art and hist—God I can’t even say it. Never mind. Just take your boring little boyfriend and get out of here.”

“Oh, because how would I go on without your blessing, dear Hilda?”

“Don’t push it, or I’ll set something of yours on fire.”

Claude didn’t doubt her for a moment. “Okie dokie,” he said, pushing the conversation away from arson. “Well, does anyone have any questions?”

Linhardt put his hand up.

“Does anyone have any questions that _aren’t_ about moving hotel?”

Linhardt put his hand back down.

“OK. Great. Everyone get to work. Lorenz and I will be leaving in an hour, in which time Hilda will be boss again.”

Everybody groaned. Hilda pulled a nail file out of her pocket and grinned as she leaned back against the sofa.

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

“And when exactly did you plan all of this?” Lorenz asked as they made their way to the carpark where their rental car was waiting. He’d taken Claude’s advice to heart and had dressed nicely – not that Lorenz ever looked bad – in a pair of brown slacks, and a loose, white button-up shirt. He’d tied his hair up too, presumably to combat the warm weather, because there was no possible way he could know it was Claude’s favourite style on him. Not unless Hilda has been running her mouth, which upon further introspection was probably _exactly_ what had happened since Lorenz had been doing it a lot more frequently. Claude didn’t know whether to curse Hilda or thank her.

“Last night,” he said casually. “When you were sleeping.”

Lorenz stopped. “Excuse me?”

“Relax!” Claude chuckled, “I fell asleep when you told me to like a good, obedient little child, don’t worry.” Lorenz made a face that made Claude smile brighter. “When you fell asleep the first time I had what the kids these days call an epiphany and shot Dimitri a message. Ended up talking to Dedue for a while since apparently Dimitri was passed out, but he sent over the images for us to analyse when he woke up.”

“I am almost certain that the kids these days do not call their ideas _epiphanies_, but I appreciate the sentiment. Let me see them,” he said, holding out his hand for Claude’s phone. Claude loaded the images and handed it over, watching Lorenz’s eyes scan the locket for anything recognisable. “It certainly looks different than I pictured,” he said.

Claude could only agree – he hadn’t expected it to be so bulky, for one, and definitely not shaped like a heart. It was what Claude could only assume to be solid gold, and intricately engraved with a design of swirling leaves. The very centre of it was set with a brilliant stone of rose cut garnet; a deep, bleeding red that in certain angles and lighting looked almost black.

“Thought it would be one of those big, ugly lockets with a corny family portrait inside?” Claude asked.

“In politer terms, I suppose, yes,” Lorenz said, handing the phone back.

“Think it’s safe to say that’s not the kind of antique you’d find back home, right? I don’t know much about Faerghus, but its colour scheme lends me towards something Adrestian. Maybe this is its true home after all.”

Lorenz hummed. “I’m inclined to agree. Gold isn’t common among Faerghus antiques, and neither are garnets. Perhaps Dimitri’s step mother had origins in Adrestia?”

“Perhaps indeed,” Claude said, shoving his hands deep in to his jean pockets. He’d had to don another disguise to walk the streets of Hresvelg today, since he was planning on stopping by the Hresvelg building for a quick look inside. He didn’t think it was a good idea to risk running in to Hubert after antagonising him so much in Aegir. The short, black wig on his head was unpleasant in such heat, but it would be better protection than a crucifix and a garland of garlic against the world's grumpiest vampire. “As well as visiting the museums, I’ve found a few antique shops on the outskirts of the city that I was hoping we could visit for an appraisal.”

“It’ll be hard without the locket in hand,” Lorenz said.

“I know, but hopefully we’ll learn something, at least. Maybe we’ll also stumble upon a few secrets, if we’re lucky. There’s something we don’t know, and I’m intent on finding it out, preferably _before_ we become a laughing stock.”

“Such optimism,” Lorenz smirked. “If only you’d employed such an astounding strategy during the Acheron case.”

“For the last time, that was _not_ my fault. Not even the greatest mind in all of Fódlan could have seen those traps coming.”

“You can keep telling yourself that, but it won’t erase the memories.”

“Oh look, our car,” Claude said in lieu of a response.

He pulled his keys out of his pocket and beeped the car open. Lorenz climbed in the passenger side, and Claude shot Linhardt a quick text to look in to Dimitri’s step mother when he was finished complaining, before pulling them out and on to the road. The drive was long, but chatting with Lorenz always made time move faster – they talked of the case first, throwing theories around and bouncing ideas off of each other, only pausing when Claude needed to listen to the GPS system’s monotonous voice point the way. Then they devolved in to generic chatter of their surroundings, the team, and the newbies. The general consensus was that Lorenz still didn't trust them, but they were ultimately harmless. After a while, Lorenz quietened slightly when they ran out of topics, and instead perused the menus of nearby restaurants, reciting the ones that sounded promising for Claude to offer what he would and wouldn’t like to eat.

They still hadn’t decided on a place by the time the expensive city of Adrestia came in to view. Like Aegir, like Gronder, and presumably like Varley, the architecture was rich and decadent. The buildings were pale, the streets impossibly clean, but interspersed among them were modern, high rise buildings of glass and stone. It looked like something out of a history book, only someone had taken great care to superimpose modern life in to it.

The GPS took them right through the city, out towards the outskirts, and towards address of the first shop Claude had programmed in. The car looked extremely out of place where they parked it upon a quiet street – it seemed to be the only car within a five mile radius.

“Quaint,” Lorenz commented, closing the car door behind him and glancing around. It was, Claude agreed. This area in particular looked more like a village than a city, with flowers hanging outside of houses in little wooden baskets, and the smell of a bakery somewhere in the distance making Claude’s stomach growl.

“The antique shop is this way,” Claude said, reading the directions from his phone. They passed a few homes and shops, and a few residents that greeted them warmly with friendly smiles. To be sure of their way, Claude asked some of them for more solid directions than the awkward map his phone was depicting, and soon enough they found their first shop wedged between a grocer’s and a bookshop.

It was a fruitless excursion – the dealer hadn’t seen anything like the locket before, and was more interested in trying to push his own paintings and furniture than appraise their jewellery. They piled back in the car and drove another twenty minutes away to the next shop. This one was a bit further in to the city, but a whole lot easier to locate. The sign ‘Hanneman’s Antiques’ was hard to miss, but the shop was empty and quiet when they stepped inside.

Hanneman introduced himself as soon as they made eye contact, a smile hidden behind his large, curled moustache. He looked every bit the antique proprietor that Claude had expected from the last shop, and he immediately offered them a tour of the premises. Being that it was one large room crammed so full of trinkets and furniture that it was hard to move, Claude declined his offer and instead followed him over to the counter where there was a hell of a lot more space. “I have something I’d like your opinion on,” Claude said.

“Oh of course, gentlemen” Hanneman said. He picked up his monocle from where it dangled around his neck, and wiped it clean with a piece of cloth. “What is it you’d like me to appraise?”

“I’m afraid we don’t have it on us,” Lorenz said. “But we were hoping you might have seen something similar.”

“We’re collectors,” Claude clarified as he loaded the images on his phone. “Do you think there might be more to this collection?”

Hanneman handled the phone like an antique, cupping it with both hands as he brought it closer to his face. Despite wearing his monocle, he still narrowed his eyes at the device as though that might help him see something hidden in the engravings.

“An interesting piece,” Hanneman said. “It’s certainly got some age on it; passed down through a few generations. Definitely Adrestian in origin, you can tell by the hallmarks, here,” he said, pointing to one of the pictures of the locket that showed its underside. Hanneman zoomed in until a small indented hallmark was visible. Claude couldn’t tell what image it was supposed to depict, but he didn’t have to think on it for long. Hanneman continued, “It’s the eagle hallmark. Means it was crafted for a member of the nobility over a few hundred years ago. Astounding that it’s been kept in such pristine condition. Where did you say you found this?”

“We have a friend,” Claude said and diverted the topic back to the locket. “You said it would have been for nobility?”

“Indeed, pieces such as this weren’t easily affordable for the common people, if at all. The craftsmanship alone would have warranted a high price tag, never mind the fact that it’s solid gold.”

Lorenz gave Claude a look that said _Figures how someone as rich as Dimitri would come to be in possession of it._

“Anything else you can tell us about it?” Claude asked.

Hanneman hummed and swiped through the images again. “It’s nothing famous or incredibly sought after, if that’s what you’re wondering,” he said. “Don’t expect to be turning out huge profits unearthing an undiscovered piece of history. This is simply a beautiful locket from an older time, crafted by an anonymous jeweller. There certainly might have been other pieces in the collection, a brooch, perhaps, some earrings to match, but if they exist, I’ve not seen them personally.”

“Oh we’re not looking to sell it,” Claude said. “We’re looking to expand the collection if we can.”

“Hm, I’m not so sure I can help with that…. But, come to think of it, I know another dealer nearby that specialises in antique jewellery. She’s a little… eccentric, but if anyone will be able to find you some provenance, it’ll be Maribelle.”

Hanneman wrote down the address of Maribelle’s shop, and promised to call her to let her know they’d be stopping by during the thirty minute drive over. It was more of a lead than Claude had thought they might get from an antique store crawl, and by the time they got to the car again, Claude’s blood was buzzing with energy despite his pitiful amount of sleep.

“So no self-righteous artefact vigilante trying to restore lost history,” Lorenz sighed. “It’s starting to make less sense the more we unearth.”

Claude tapped his fingers against the steering wheel. “Or maybe we’re just not looking in the right places.”

He dug his phone back out of his pocket and noticed a text from Linhardt: _Dimitri’s step mother is called Patricia. Other than her name on some of Dimitri’s medical records, all other records of her existing have been wiped for some reason_. _Anything else before I nap?_

“Linhardt says Dimitri’s step mother has been erased from the internet. Looks like I’ll have to send Ignatz out on a hunt for documents.”

“Erased? Not even a death certificate?”

Claude shook his head. “Nope. Only evidence there is of her existing, is her signing a few medical forms for Dimitri as a child.”

“Does Dimitri know this?”

“Hard to say. I always felt like there was something he was hiding. Maybe it’s something to do with Patricia. Seems like we’ll be having ourselves a little video conference later on.”

Lorenz hummed and tapped his chin with his finger. “You said she was Dimitri’s step mother, correct?” Claude’s nod was more a dip of his head to prompt Lorenz in to continuing. “Do you think she might have had other children in a previous relationship? Maybe they’ll know more about her and her locket.”

For a moment, it felt as though Lorenz had just grabbed Claude by the shoulders and shaken him awake, as though a thick cloud of fog had suddenly dispersed and granted him perfect clarity. Then, just as quickly as he had become excited to have found the answer, doubt descended upon all of his theories and quashed them before they could grow.

“But wouldn’t Dimitri _know_ if he had step siblings? I mean, that’s a pretty big thing to hide from a family, right? A whole person.”

“I’m sure it’s been done before,” Lorenz said.

“I guess,” Claude mused. It was a better theory than none, anyway – a hidden step-sibling. Maybe Caspar had been on to something back at the hotel. He’d be thrilled.

Claude sent a text to Hilda on behalf of all those researching: _tell me the names of everyone’s mothers pls_

She replied almost immediately, and Claude could feel in his bones that she’d spent most of the morning on her phone, rather than doing the work: _im not asking the newbies for their mothers names thats weird bro theyre gonna think im trying to commit fraud or smth_

Claude: _not YOUR mothers you dumb fuck. edelgard, ferdinand, hubert, dorothea, bernadetta – get me their mothers names. quick_

Hilda: _A L R I G H T calm down bitch !!! give me a sec_

It took almost fifteen minutes for Hilda to reply, in which time Claude had already gotten him and Lorenz back on the road towards Maribelle’s shop. Lorenz opened the text on his behalf, and read it aloud. “If Hilda’s research is to be trusted, none of them have mothers called Patricia,” he sighed. “That certainly is a disappointment.”

It was a disappointment, but Claude didn’t _feel_ disappointed. This felt closer to the truth than anything else he’d discovered thus far. Maybe there was another hidden player. Maybe the Flame Emperor themselves had a mother called Patricia.

“We’ll confront Dimitri later,” Claude said. “I’m sure he’ll enlighten us. In the meantime, send Hilda another text asking if the newbies know anything about Patricia. They grew up with him, they should know something, at least.”

“I’m sure that has been mentioned at one point,” Lorenz said, disinterested. It was no secret that he tried to tune out the newcomers as often as he possibly could.

They didn’t get another text until they were parked up outside Maribelle’s.

All Hilda texted back was: _felix said ‘who the fuck is patricia????’ lol u should see his face. looks like he fucked a lemon _

Claude frowned at his phone when Hilda sent a complimentary picture of Felix scowling, and then shot back: _dimitri’s step mother? He knows her, right??_

Sylvain decided to text back on Hilda’s behalf, his grammar suddenly vastly improved from the usual illegible nonsense Claude received from him: _We don’t know anything about Dimitri’s family. He’s never told us. _

Then just as quickly: _Why are you asking? Is something wrong?_

Claude: _just curious. don’t worry about it. we’ll be back in a couple of hours._

“They don’t know anything about her either. I want to call Dimitri now but I’d rather gauge his expression in person.”

“And I thought our team’s initial trust issues were bad,” Lorenz scoffed.

“That was just you, Lorenz,” Claude grinned. Lorenz opened his mouth to protest, but Claude pushed him out of the car, linked their arms, and pulled him across the street to Maribelle’s.

It seemed as though Maribelle was in direct competition with Hanneman to outdo his sign – hers was not only significantly larger, but was also fitted out with lights that illuminated absolutely nothing when competing with the glaring light of the summer sun. Her shop was also bigger inside, and was kept tidy and methodical. The furniture was arranged nicely, the jewellery displayed in well-lit cases upon cushions of red velvet, and the shelves of ceramics and ornaments were colour co-ordinated and arranged from smallest to largest.

“You must be the boys Hanneman was harping on about,” Maribelle said from behind her counter. If Hanneman was exactly what Claude imagined an antique store owner to look like, Maribelle was the complete opposite. If not for the old fashioned dress she wore of frilled pink fabric, and matching umbrella opened over her shoulder that made her look as though she permanently lived in a time before all of their ages combined, Claude would have placed her as a teacher, or something equally as intimidating. She had that kind of aura that said she was judging bad manners _constantly. _Maybe it would be better to let Lorenz take the lead on this one.

“That would be us,” Claude said, holding out a hand in greeting. Maribelle took down her umbrella and extended a gloved hand of her own. She shook Claude’s like a queen would her common subjects - as though the very idea of shaking his hand repulsed her. “You must be Maribelle the Jewellery Expert.”

“You could say I have a particular interest in antique jewellery that exceeds most others,” Maribelle said. “What is it that you’d like to know?”

Claude nudged Lorenz to take the lead and he did so without complaint. Usually he would have sighed upon Claude forcing him to do stuff on his behalf, but he supposed it must have been bad manners to do so in front a lady, or whatever.

“If it wouldn’t trouble you, we’d love for your expert opinion on this locket,” he said, handing over his phone.

The first thing Maribelle said upon seeing the image, however, was not an awe inspired remark at its beauty, or a confused denial of knowledge, instead, it was an unimpressed, “Oh this thing again?”

Claude stopped. “Again? You’ve seen it before?”

“Yes, just a few days ago, actually. A beautiful young lady came in with it, asking for an authentication of its hallmarks. Such a polite woman, but I found it rather ugly myself,” she said, clutching the pendant around her own neck. “I much prefer silver.”

“A young girl came in with it? What did she look like?”

Maribelle clicked her tongue and wagged a reprimanding finger. “Now, now, I’m sure that breaks customer confidentiality.”

Claude debated heavily on what he should say next, and it seemed as though Lorenz was waiting for him to make the first move too. If whoever had taken the locket had already been through here, it was very possible that Maribelle’s loyalty had been bought. One phone call would tip the Flame Emperor off and alert them to their trail being followed. But on the other hand, if Maribelle knew that a thief had asked for her appraisal, it was also likely that she would change her stance on the matter and cooperate with Claude and Lorenz for justice. In the end, Claude settled for the former. The risk of the latter was too high.

“A shame,” Claude said with a sad shake of his head. “We’ve been after this piece for a while. It would fit perfectly in our collection of ancient Adrestian antiquities. We were hoping to open an exhibit, you see, showcasing the beauty and history of Adrestia. We’ve already amassed a great collection of vases and paintings to display. Do you think this woman of yours might be open to negotiation? We’d love to buy it from her.”

“Oh no,” Maribelle said. “I can tell you that she was father fond of it. She said she’d just gotten it back after being apart from it for a long time. It was her mother’s, you see. She passed away a while ago.”

Claude was sure _that_ was a breach of customer confidentiality, but there was no way in hell he was about to remind Maribelle when she was spilling secrets so freely. Maybe she hadn’t been bought after all.

“Regretful,” Lorenz said. “Still, would you be so kind as to divulge some of its history? We could still incorporate such knowledge in to our exhibit pamphlets.”

She thought on it for a moment before her face stretched in to a sly smile. “I suppose I could, if you would be willing to amply credit my valuable historical knowledge where all can see.”

Claude only felt_ slightly_ bad for lying about this fake antique exhibit when Maribelle seemed so genuinely interested in the potential business opportunity. Not bad enough though, to stop himself from heartily agreeing with Lorenz when he said, “Of course! I’ll drop you my business card and you can send over your details for proper citation if you so desire.”

Maribelle took the card with two fingers and slid it up the sleeve of her dress. “Follow me, gentlemen,” she said, beckoning towards a door behind the counter. Claude gave Lorenz a look before shrugging and following her inside.

The back room looked more like a small living room – fit out with some kitchen amenities and plush sofas. It smelled overwhelmingly of coffee and rose. “For quiet days,” Maribelle explained and gestured to one of the sofas. “It can get quite boring standing out front waiting for someone to stop by an antique shop. It’s quite a scarce business these days, what with so much competition popping up all over the city. People are always looking to sell, but hardly ever to buy.”

“I imagine your central location would at least draw in a few more customers than the more rural spots,” Lorenz said, taking his seat next to Claude’s so closely that their knees touched.

“Still not as much as I would like,” Maribelle sighed. “But enough about that. Let me just go and grab my records, and then I’ll see to your locket again. I’ll tell you everything I can remember off the top of my head. That young lady had a few things to say too, but you’ll only be using _my_ name for the citation, yes?”

“Of course.” Claude nodded and set his phone to record, placing it on the table near to Maribelle while she retrieved a large leather bound book. When she returned, she opened it and poised a pen to write.

“I record the names and purposes of all who come here for information,” Maribelle said. “I like to remember should anyone come back. May I take yours?”

“You can just record us under the surname Acheron,” Lorenz said, and Claude almost lost his composure to a fit of laughter. Maribelle nodded and jotted down the name. She was holding the book too closely for Claude to catch a glimpse of what was written down, and Claude had to settle for letting his stomach burn in curiosity. Somewhere upon those pages was the name of their thief.

When she was done, she closed the book with a hefty _thump_, and Claude gestured for her to begin talking. And talk she did.

“This locket was likely made around one-hundred-and-twenty years ago,” she began. “In my professional opinion it was originally crafted for the family of Ionius - a prominent noble family at that time. The colour of the garnet matches almost exactly with other pieces of clothing, art, and weaponry possessed by the family – it was a trademark of theirs I suppose, to embed garnets in to nearly everything they owned. There are quite a few pieces here, actually, with those same garnets, but they belonged to the extended family – much smaller in size and not as impressive.”

“So… this locket belonged to the main family?”

Maribelle smiled like a teacher would at a clever student. “Yes,” she said. “The size and cut of this garnet lends me to believe that it was a gift from Ionius himself to his wife. From there it was passed down unto the son who in turn made it a gift to express his love for _his_ wife and so on, until the family lost prominence during the change of times, and the tradition eventually faded in to obscurity.”

Claude bounced his knee excitedly, and Lorenz put a hand on it to keep him still. “How do you know this for certain?” Claude asked. “Are there records somewhere?”

Maribelle scoffed. “I had my own assumptions after years of research in to Adrestian noble family politics and such, but that young lady was the one to confirm my theory. She herself said that she was a descendent of the Ionius family, and that the locket was usually passed down to the sons. She also said, that very unfortunately, all of her siblings passed to illness, and that she was the only one left to receive it.”

“But she also said that it had gone missing for a while, no?”

“Ah yes, a ‘mix-up’ she called it. But she didn’t elaborate any further on the matter, and as you can tell, I am a woman that values manners and decorum over answers, and so I didn’t dare to push her for anything more.”

Claude kind of wished ‘manners and decorum’ didn’t exist as of right now. More than anything, he wanted Maribelle to say something along the lines of ‘_Oh yes! She said that the locket fell in to the hands of one Dimitri Alexandre Blaidydd, and she just recently staged an elaborate heist to regain her lost heirloom!’ _But Claude was never that lucky.

Was this woman part of the heist? Or was she just the recipient of the Flame Emperor’s hired work? How did one woman manage to rope three of the largest companies in Adrestia in to cooperating with her for one tiny locket? Every answer Claude unearthed created a dozen new questions, but at least they had something solid now.

All that was left to do, was to interrogate Dimitri on his long lost step siblings, and prepare to break in to Maribelle’s Shop of Antiques for the name hidden inside her book.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tysm for reading omg we're getting somewhere lmao


	13. AN ERASED EXISTENCE.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN: HILDA

AN ERASED EXISTENCE.

“I still can’t believe you don’t know your best friend’s mother’s name,” Hilda scoffed. It had almost been an hour since Claude’s bout of mysterious texts, and Hilda was getting bored with how diligently everyone seemed to be working rather than gossiping about the new elephant sized truth bombshell that had exploded inside the hotel room. Linhardt had gone back to sleep after digging whatever dirt he’d been instructed to find too, and now they were being forced to _wait_ to know what was going on. Hilda thought maybe this was quite an effective torture method.

Felix looked up from his screen and at Hilda like he was hoping lasers would burst from his eyes and reduce her to a pile of smoking ash. Little did Felix know, Hilda was so used to looks of that calibre that she’d long grown immune to their intimidating effects. He’d have to try a lot harder than an elevated look of constipation to wrangle her away from antagonism and in to silence.

“_Step-_mother,” Sylvain corrected, as if he had any clue what Dimitri’s birth mother’s name was either. “It’s not that strange, really. We never met her growing up, and Dimitri never talked about her. He didn’t talk about any members of his family, really, now that I think about it. Except maybe a little about his dad.” Sylvain took a different approach then, crossing his arms over his chest as though he’d just come up with a fool-proof solution to his lack of knowledge. “Maybe it’s my fault,” he said. “Maybe he did mention it and I just can’t remember.”

“Yeah, Hilda,” Caspar said. “I bet you can’t remember what _my_ mother’s name is.”

Hilda raised an eyebrow at Caspar. “You’re forgetting the specified _best friend _part of that statement_, _shit stick. I couldn’t give a fuck what your mother’s name is.”

“_Wow_,” Caspar muttered more to himself than anyone else.

Hilda, as previously stated, did not give a fuck; she had a brand to maintain, but she _did_ know Caspar’s mother’s name, purely because he never shut up about anything. Ever. By forced extension, she also knew the name of his father, brother, uncle, step-uncle, step-aunt, and, after spending the last three hours with him in the hotel room, now knew the names of his imagined undercover family too.

“Whatever,” Hilda said. “All I’m saying is maybe you two should start thinking about if there are any other secrets your boss-friend is keeping from you.”

“There are,” Felix said through gritted teeth. “And I’ll strangle them out of him if I have to.”

“Hey, hey, hey!” Sylvain put a hand on Felix’s shoulder. “There’ll be no strangling, right?”

Felix clenched his fists. “Maybe some light punching too.”

“Felix, you can’t—”

“Hate to stir the pot,” Hilda cut in, relishing in the very _idea_ of stirring the pot, “but isn’t Felix kind of right? I mean, Dimitri sent you down here to deal with this case and didn’t even bother to tell you what you were getting in to. The least he could have done before throwing you in to the deep end was get you up to speed on the whole situation.”

“Yeah,” Felix narrowed his eyes at Sylvain. “Pinky’s right. Why do you keep defending him?”

Hilda blinked and opened her mouth to protest the undesired nickname and give Felix a creative one of his own, but Marianne put an amused hand on her knee and it screamed: _Let him have this one, he’s trying._ Hilda reluctantly closed her mouth.

“Gah, I don’t know.” Sylvain combed a frustrated hand through his hair. “I don’t want to see you upset, I guess.”

Felix scoffed, but Hilda noticed the tips of his ears reddening and suddenly, a lot of things made sense about the prickly bodyguard. That blush certainly was interesting, though not as interesting as whatever secret discoveries Claude was keeping over a hundred miles away.

“I’m not upset,” Felix said, leaning back with a scowl. “I’m angry.”

“Hey,” Raphael offered, “you can punch your friends and they still be friends. Leonie and I punch each other all the time.”

“That’s called sparring, Raph,” Leonie said. “I think Felix is leaning more towards aggravated assault.”

“Oh, that’s not good. Leonie does that a lot and it takes forever to get her out of detention. The local police really like to take their time with things, especially when Leonie starts—”

Leonie held up her hands in an _Are you serious?_ gesture, and changed the topic. “OK, I’m gonna stop you there before this turns in to a Leonie roasting session. _Again._ If you all want to know more about whatever’s going on, why don’t we just wake Linhardt up and ask?”

Simultaneously, everybody turned to face Linhardt’s sleeping form. He had passed out in the corner an hour ago, curled up with some blankets and a pillow that Caspar had brought from their room, and hadn’t so much as stirred since. Caspar threw an arm out defensively in front of his boyfriend and looked like he’d take on the world to earn Linhardt a few more precious minutes of sleep if he had to.

“Come on guys, he’s sleeping.”

“He’s been sleeping for ages,” Leonie said. “Wake him. We need to know what Claude asked for.”

Caspar shook his head. “No. I’m doing this for your sakes as much as his. If anyone but me wakes him, then you’ll _all_ have phones that scream at night, or probably worse. I’ve seen what kind of plans he’s been cooking up and none of them look fun for you.”

“Yeah, and whatever it is, I’ll reverse it,” Lysithea said impatiently. “Just wake him up. Or I’ll get a glass of water and drown him.”

Caspar groaned, but he managed to coax Linhardt awake with a few soft words and a few more promises that Hilda couldn’t quite hear.

Initially, Linhardt looked as though he was already plotting half of the team’s deaths having been forcibly woken, but after a few minutes, in which Caspar supplied him with some cake and peach tea, he came around and fell in to his usual state of indifference. Everybody knew better than to push him before he was ready to speak, and even Hilda and Leonie managed to bite their tongues while they waited.

“Why have you awoken me?” he asked, sounding like a king addressing a group of his subjects, unworthy of standing in his presence. All he needed was a cloak and a crown, he already had the pomp and the attitude.

“What did Claude ask you to look up?” Lysithea asked immediately. “It was about Dimitri’s step-mother, wasn’t it?”

Linhardt rolled his eyes and Hilda thought for a moment that they might disappear in to the back of his head, the roll was so strong. “You woke me up for _that?_ Why can’t you just text him? Or wait until he gets home? He’ll only explain it again anyway. You’re all so stupid.”

Caspar gave them all a look that said: _I told you so _and also a little _He means you’re all stupid except me._

“He could be gone for hours still, and he’s already told us to wait,” Hilda said with an impatient click of her tongue. “Tell us now or I’ll rip your dick off.”

“I’m too tired to even bother arguing with you,” he yawned. “But if Claude asks why I told you, I’m telling him you held me at gunpoint, because his lectures are annoying and long.” The team nodded agreement; it was a sacrifice they were willing to make if it meant learning the truth a few hours earlier. Hilda thought she might seriously lose her mind if she stared at the wall of text on her laptop screen any longer. She gestured for him to hurry up about it, and Linhardt rolled his eyes again. “Yes, Claude wanted me to look in to Dimitri’s step-mother. But other than her name being on a few medical documents signed on Dimitri’s behalf, there are no records of her ever having existed. At least digitally: she’s been wiped from the internet.”

“So, what?” Felix asked, tone more confused than angry at this point. “Dimitri wiped the information? Or someone else?”

Linhardt shrugged. “No clue. It’s not like I can even begin to find out who has deleted something online, especially someone looking to erase the existence of a whole person so thoroughly. I don’t imagine they’d do so without knowing how to cover their tracks, but they must have messed up somewhere along the line, however, because they didn’t check through Dimitri’s documentation to see if they’d missed anything. Not that it matters, because it means we have next to nothing anyway.”

“I guess that means _I’ll_ be going real-life document hunting,” Ignatz sighed.

“I would help you,” Linhardt said. “But, you know, my allergies, or whatever.”

“Ah yes,” Ignatz said with a bitter twist of his lips. “The allergy to dust that you definitely have that only seems to come about when I need your help with something.”

Linhardt hummed absently in agreement. “So was that all you wanted? Can I go back to sleep now?”

“No,” Lysithea said. “You’re going to show us what you found. We’re going to make sense of this before Claude and Lorenz get back because believe it or not, I actually enjoy being useful.”

“You can all operate computers,” Linhardt said, a look of disgust plain on his face that Hilda could definitely sympathise with. He started plumping his pillow and then laid back down again, throwing the blanket over his head. “Do it yourselves.”

Hilda didn’t want to do it herself. Hilda didn’t _like_ doing _anything_ herself. Especially not when someone could do it better, and _especially_ not when someone had already done it, and was just being a spoiled brat about it.

“Hey Linhardt,” Hilda said. “Remember when Claude said I was in charge? I’m still in charge and I’m telling you to load that shit up.”

Linhardt turned over and popped his face out from beneath the blanket. He made a face that looked even more disgusted than the last and said, “I don’t listen to him, what makes you think I’m going to listen to you?”

“Because I’m not a coward,” Hilda said, and then to Leonie, “Fetch me the taser and the climbing rope.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

\--CLAUDE—

“I’m just saying,” Lorenz said, “that you’re being extremely optimistic if you think they’ve gotten any work done while we were out. It took Hilda more time than it should have to come back with those names when they should have already been written down as the first port of call.”

“Lysithea won’t stand for any nonsense,” Claude waved him off as they finally approached the hotel elevators. The jaunt around the museum hadn’t yielded any results other than a confirmation that Adrestian antiquities were gold and pretty, and they hadn’t gotten far inside the Hresvelg building before needing to make a swift exit. The amount of security swarming the building would have been alarming had Claude not been expecting to see it; people in expensive suits stood in every corner, by every door, by every elevator, probably in every bathroom stall too. They were lucky that their infiltration would first come in the form of Leonie, Raphael, and Caspar’s undercover mission, because trying to get anywhere when guards with communicative earpieces and intimidating sunglasses were breathing down their necks would have been next to impossible without getting thrown out and found out.

“Lysithea may not stand for idleness, but Hilda can be very persuasive when she wants to be. It might be wise for you to consider electing Marianne as the second-in-command from now on.”

Claude laughed. “Geez, Lorenz. What do you think’s happened under her rule? It’s not like she’s gonna order them to kill each other.”

“It’s Sylvain and Felix’s safety I am concerned for the most,” he said with a grim frown that Claude caught in the elevator mirror reflection. A slight blush had tinted his cheeks red after such a long day out in the sun, and the breeze had tousled his hair out of its bun; it was always a delight to see the usually immaculately turned out Lorenz a little dishevelled. Claude couldn’t help but to stare. “She appeared to be taunting Felix in her text messages, and Leonie and Caspar would not think twice about starting a fist fight if Hilda was to give the order.”

The elevator doors opened on to their floor and Claude stepped out first. “Cut them some slack,” he said. “I think they’ve all been getting along fine. Remember how it was when Linhardt and Caspar first joined? I thought they’d never settle, and now Hilda treats those two like siblings.”

The prank war between the newbies and the veterans had lasted an excruciatingly long time, and on more than a few occasions, Claude had had to beg Linhardt not to leave prematurely. Acquiring him as a new tech had taken enough persuading to begin with – one of the terms of his acceptance being that he only came if Caspar did, and another being that nobody was allowed to wake him from his medically required naps that Claude wasn’t so sure were actually medically required at all. Linhardt also wasn’t the most patient person in the world when it came to unnecessary inconveniences, but both he and Caspar seemed to pass the team’s tests eventually, and if anything, their stand-offish treatment of Felix and Sylvain was quite relaxed in comparison.

“Yes, maybe a little _too_ much like siblings,” Lorenz said. “I fear one day we might walk in on them having set up a temporary wrestling ring to settle their differences—oh wait, they’ve already done that on several occasions and broken enough furniture to last a lifetime.”

“They wouldn’t do that here,” Claude laughed. “They know better.”

Arriving outside the hotel room, Claude stopped in his tracks. Unintelligible shouting came from within, accompanied by worrying crashing noises and the occasional scream. Claude’s stomach dropped like a broken elevator and he gave Lorenz a concerned glance that was returned with an unimpressed raise of an eyebrow. As he fumbled for his card key, Claude considered the idea that the hotel room had been broken in to, that the Flame Emperor had discovered their location and sent a threat to deal with his team, but Lorenz’s calm posture steered him away from catastrophizing what was more than likely just a small riot.

The scene upon opening the door was nothing short of chaos.

Two chairs sat by the window, and on them, sat Linhardt and Caspar, tied up with the climbing ropes used for infiltration missions. They were gagged with what looked like multiple socks tied together, and while Linhardt was sitting stoically with his eyes closed, Caspar was thrashing against the restrains, attempting to shout muffled obscenities through the material tied around his face.

In front of the chairs, Leonie and Felix were fighting inside an impromptu fighting ring made of pillows and blankets. Claude couldn’t say for sure if there was any ill intent behind the blows they were trading, but judging by the way Sylvain was cheering for Felix, and Raphael and Ignatz for Leonie, he placed his bets on it being a sparring match. In the middle of the goddamn hotel room. In the middle of _his _goddamn hotel room.

Marianne, bless her soul, was sitting off to the side by a makeshift scoreboard of more pizza box cardboard, a first-aid kit perched in her lap, and an extremely concerned frown on her face. Luckily, nobody seemed to have needed her expertise as of yet; there were no bandages wrapped around limbs, or stuck to faces, but Raphael was holding a cold water bottle to his nose that Claude could only attribute to a fight between him and Leonie.

Hilda was standing above it all on the bed, umpiring the match with a hairbrush-microphone in one hand, a taser in the other, and an enthusiasm Claude hadn’t seen from her in a very long time. The laptops were all discarded to another side of the room – Lysithea’s side of the room, where she was still tapping away on her open laptop with a pair of noise-cancelling headphones tucked neatly over her ears.

Everything was topped off with an upbeat pop song blasting ironically cheerful lyrics, like the headlock Leonie had Felix in was nothing to be even remotely concerned about. All that was missing was a dead body, a broken window, and a small fire burning somewhere in amongst all the mess for the scene to truly be set.

Caspar noticed Claude first, and he thrashed harder against the restraints for help, but Claude didn’t move to help him. He just stood dumfounded in the doorway with Lorenz struggling to contain his laughter behind him. Leonie noticed Claude next; she threw Felix over her shoulder in an impressive wrestling-like lift and slammed him against the softness of the blankets before pinning him down. When she looked up for support, she found Claude standing mouth agape instead, and Claude could pinpoint the exact moment her blood turned to ice.

Everybody else’s gazes followed.

The music cut.

The shouting ceased.

Sylvain said, “Oh shit, your parents are home.”

Claude didn’t give them any time to explain, not that anyone_ could_ do anything other than stand there in shocked silence like a collection of carved statues. “I’m going to go and get a coffee,” he said calmly, and closed the door behind him again. He heard another “Oh shit,” through the wall, and then hushed, hurried movement as everybody scrambled to clear the evidence.

“What was that about cutting them some slack?” Lorenz laughed, and Claude caught a tear forming in one of his eyes he’d laughed so much.

Claude took a deep breath in to stop himself from smiling too, but it was extremely difficult with Lorenz still chuckling softly behind him. “I’m just going to pretend we didn’t see that,” he said. “We’re going to get a coffee, go back in exactly five minutes, and they’d better hope to the goddess that we don’t get any noise complaints, because if a member of staff so much as looks in my direction, I’m calling Judith down here to kick all of their asses individually.”

Lorenz laughed again, and didn’t stop until the elevator reached the bottom floor. Claude didn’t stop smiling even when they got to the hotel café. After a day of breakthroughs, Claude couldn’t get mad, nor could he blame the team for letting off some steam after a tough few days. They’d made some serious breakthroughs, were about to make some more after a call with Dimitri, and were about to begin the next phase of infiltration. Plus, Felix and Sylvain looked to be integrating better than Claude could have hoped.

“Bets on who started it?” Claude sighed after ordering their coffees.

Lorenz didn’t miss a beat. “Without question: Hilda.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

When Claude opened the hotel room door the second time, every single person inside was sitting behind a laptop, headphones on, diligently working like an office employee during crunch time. The music had been replaced by the methodical tapping of keyboard keys, and the beds were made as though room service had come by in the time Claude had been gone; it was actually quite impressive considering how much of a mess the room had once been. If not for the newly forming bruise on Raphael’s nose, and the furious, burning look in Caspar’s eyes, Claude could have believed that the earlier events hadn’t taken place at all.

“Oh, Master Riegan, welcome back!” Hilda said, glancing up from her laptop with the fakest smile Claude had ever seen. He bet his savings that if he turned her laptop screen around, he’d find a word document full of jumbled letters, rather than anything of actual use. “We were not anticipating your arrival, pardon our inhospitality.”

Claude sipped his coffee. “We got coffee,” he said.

Caspar quickly looked up from his screen and tried to blurt “They tried to tas—” but Leonie clapped a hand over his mouth and kicked him in the shin. He shut up with a yelp, but he looked no less furious.

“Did you have a pleasant trip, milords?” Leonie asked with an unsettling smile of her own.

Lorenz walked over to the window with a badly concealed smirk. “It was wonderful,” he said. “Very fruitful. Did you get up to much while we were gone?”

“Just work,” Ignatz said, though Claude could see that the forced nonchalance was hurting him way more than it was hurting anybody else; his need to come clean was almost palpable.

“Just work,” Claude echoed. “I’m so glad. Lorenz thought you’d have set up a wrestling ring to beat the shit out of each other in our absence, or possibly even maimed one of the newbies,” he laughed. “I said you’d never do such a thing.”

“It must be so pleasing to know you were right,” Lorenz said without bothering to edit his voice of sarcasm.

“Indeed,” Claude said. “You all must have worked so hard on those tasks I set for you. Hilda, would you like to start by telling me what you learned about Bernadetta Varley and Varley Prints?”

Hilda cleared her throat and exchanged a glance with Marianne. “Of course, your majesty, please give me one moment to prepare the sufficient documentation.”

“No, no,” Claude said. “Off the cuff. You should know it all well enough by now, no? You’ve spent the past eight hours or so researching it.”

Hilda glanced down at her screen again and her fingers tapped multiple buttons as she very obviously trawled the internet for something valuable to say. “Yes,” she said eventually. “That’s exactly what I’ve been doing, you’re _so_ right, but also, consider this: I have such an awful memory. I wouldn’t want to waste your time trying to remember all those tiny, small, insignificant details. You’d be much better off asking Marianne, or even Felix – he’s got a _great _memory, don’t you, Felix?”

Felix avoided eye contact completely and pretended he hadn’t heard Hilda at all.

Claude smiled at her, and watched her face drop in to a pissed-off scowl. She’d give him hell for the interrogation later, but that would be the least of her worries if they got kicked out of the hotel early. They didn’t have time to relocate _before_ tomorrow morning’s interviews. Claude trusted the tech team enough to have completed their set-up before joining the chaos, and trying to dismantle everything to drive it three hours away would be a total nightmare in such a short period of time. “That’s not a problem. Take your time.”

Claude watched the rest of the team – including Sylvain and Felix – wince as Hilda cleared her throat and began, “Bernadetta Varley is a… woman.” She paused and narrowed her eyes at the screen. “With purple hair.”

“Which we already knew because Lysithea pulled pictures of everyone involved so far and put them in a ‘lookout’ folder for our surveillance footage search, yes,” Lorenz said, prompting Hilda to continue.

“She, uh, owns Varley Prints, obviously, and—you know what, fuck this. Why was Patricia wiped from the internet?”

Claude raised an eyebrow at Linhardt who had positioned himself as far away from Hilda as possible. He held his hands up in surrender and said, “She tied me up and threatened to ‘tase my genitals’ if I didn’t comply and show her all of the research you asked for.”

“And she threatened to tase me just because she wanted to!” Caspar added, finally getting around Leonie’s restraints.

“Nobody lets me have shit in this house,” he sighed, taking a seat. “Yes, it’s true that Linhardt’s research turned up next to no digital evidence, which can only mean that it was forcibly removed by a third party.” He turned to Felix and Sylvain who had finally deemed it safe enough to look up from their fake research. “You’re both sure that Dimitri’s never mentioned Patricia?”

“I mean, yeah,” Sylvain shrugged. “We didn’t even know she existed until this whole business.”

Claude hummed and explained the day’s revelations in more detail; from the origins of the locket, to Maribelle’s customer and the book of names.

“I’ll need to take a small team to get that name,” Claude said. “Leonie, Raph, and Caspar, you’re exempt: I need you getting a good night’s rest in preparation for tomorrow morning. Linhardt and Lysithea, you’ll need to stay behind to monitor the interviews and equipment, and Ignatz will be looking for Patricia’s existence in paper documentation form. Hilda and the newbies, I want you to stay here and do nothing. Marianne, you’ll be coming with Lorenz and I – we’ll be leaving in a couple of hours.”

Hilda groaned. “Thank god.”

“Do you think I can trust you not to stage a riot this time?” Claude asked.

“I literally have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Of course not. In the meantime, I think it’s time to give Mr. Blaidydd a call.”

⬗ ⬗ ⬗

\-- FELIX—

It took a frustratingly long time to get the call set up for everybody to see. Felix could feel his nerves fraying, watching Lysithea tap this button, plug this wire in, install this update real quick. They’d already turned the lights off, and were projecting the blank video feed on to a wall with a device Felix had never seen before. Felix tried not to pay attention to his own scowling face being reflected back at him as he paced the room.

He wasn’t going to cause a scene. Sylvain had privately reminded him not to, but he hadn’t_ needed_ to ask. Felix was perfectly capable of letting Claude do his job, and he was also perfectly capable of keeping his anger in check. He’d had plenty of practice over the years working for Dimitri, even if he did slip up on occasion.

“Let me do the talking,” Claude reminded everybody. “Only contribute if you have something extremely worthwhile to add.”

Felix had a plethora of extremely worthwhile things to say to Dimitri. _What the fuck are you playing at?_ being the first one to spring to mind. A string of curses and a promise to beat the shit out of him for lying being another. Felix could only hope there was a damn good explanation lying in waiting because he could drive real fast when he was angry enough, and he didn’t think it would be that hard to convince Hilda to tie Sylvain up so he wouldn’t get stopped before he reached him.

“It’s ringing,” Lysithea said, and Felix could hear the monotonous trilling beep of a connecting call coming from her laptop. After a few rings, the sound became louder once she turned up the volume through the portable speakers.

When Dimitri picked up, the first thing Felix noted was that he looked a whole lot more like a functioning human being than he had the last time he’d seen him. Colour had found its way back in to his cheeks, and he no longer looked like death warmed over. Dedue must have finally convinced him to calm down somehow, and Felix silently despised the idea that Dimitri only ever seemed to listen to Dedue’s advice while ignoring the advice given by the rest of his friends.

Sylvain put a steady hand on Felix’s shoulder and Felix stopped pacing to stand at his side. Sylvain leaned down and said so close to Felix’s ear that he shuddered: “Stay calm.”

Felix knocked him away lightly with an elbow. “Shut up.”

“Good evening, Mr. Blaidydd,” Claude said with affected cheer. “I hope you’re doing well.”

Dimitri’s brow furrowed on screen. “I am, thank you, Mr. Riegan. How is everything going? Do you have news?”

“News?” Claude asked. “No, unfortunately, no news as of yet. Just a few questions.”

“Oh,” Dimitri said. “Questions for me?”

_Yes questions for you, you dumb boar,_ Felix thought, clenching his fists.

“Yes,” Claude said, and Felix didn’t think he was imagining the slight irritated strain to Claude’s voice either. “Questions for you. I’ve told you before that I don’t enjoy putting my team in danger, and that I require _all_ the information about a case before I take it on, yes?”

Dimitri looked lost. “Yes?”

“Then why are there still things being kept from me, Mr. Blaidydd? Your step-mother, Patricia. Why has all evidence of her existence been wiped?”

“Why it’s--It’s _what?_”

“Oh, that’s interesting,” Lorenz said quietly, but Felix wasn’t surprised. He hadn’t suspected that Dimitri had had a hand in something as ominous as wiping his own relative’s existence, but then Claude and his team didn’t know Dimitri like Felix and Sylvain did.

Claude looked pensive. “You had nothing to do with the removal of your step-mother’s online presence?”

Felix watched Dimitri’s face jump from affronted, to concerned, to downright worried. “No,” he said a little helplessly. “I had no idea. Why would somebody do that?” He turned to somebody off screen, and shortly after, Dedue settled in to the frame and sat shoulder-to-shoulder with Dimitri.

Claude studied Dimitri’s face with such an intensity, that Felix wondered for a second if he had some kind of mind-reading ability that he was putting to use. “If you can’t shed any light on her disappearance, would you instead care to explain why none of your friends know of your step-mother’s existence? You understand why we would come to assume your involvement when you already act as though she doesn't exist.”

Felix narrowed his eyes then, and crossed his arms over his chest. He stared right at Dimitri’s pixelated face and hoped that Dimitri could see how pissed off he was about being kept in the dark.

“Ah, yes, yes, I understand how it looks,” Dimitri said quietly. Dedue shuffled and took his hand and Felix rolled his eyes. Of course Dedue already knew. “I lost my birth mother as a baby,” he began. “I don’t remember her at all, other than what my father would say about her, and what I saw of her in pictures. But a few years later, my father remarried, and Patricia treated me as she would her own child. It was unfortunate that I only got to know her for a short time: she was wonderful, but she passed away when I was eight. The last I remember of her, she was handing me the locket and telling me that she loved me like I was her own son.”

Felix thought back to how old they’d been when they first met. If his memory served him correctly, they’d been ten. That meant that two years had passed since her death the morning they were thrown together in class for the first time. Now every interaction, every memory felt different, like Felix should have known somehow, should have noticed, should have said something.

Dimitri continued: “My father was heavily affected by her death; he threw himself in to his work and grew the Blaidydd business in to what it is today, but that meant I hardly ever saw him, and he made it hard to ever talk about Patricia. He was so grief-stricken it was like I lost him too. So, I simply neglected to talk about her; to my father, to my other relatives, and to my friends. It made it a lot easier to deal with the loss, and to stay in my father’s good graces.”

Felix knew the rest. Dimitri talked about Lambert sparingly growing up, but when he did, he talked of how he was always staying late nights at the office, sometimes neglecting to come home at all. Dimitri would stay over at Felix’s house more often than not, and his father, Rodrigue, would treat him like a son of his own – sometimes better than the two sons he often forgot he had.

When Lambert passed many years later, Dimitri was forced to deal with the burden of the business, and sort out the mess his father had left behind. Felix, Sylvain, and Ingrid had followed him of course, working as security, and the rest was history.

Looking at him now, it felt as though Felix were suddenly looking at his childhood friend through a new pair of lenses, as though he suddenly knew nothing when he’d once thought he known everything. He wasn’t sure whether the heat in his blood was frustration and anger at being kept at arm’s length, or shame that he hadn’t even bothered to ask about his family before now.

Sylvain seemed to feel the same way, or at least he seemed to feel _some_ kind of way, because the white-knuckle grip he had on Felix’s sleeve was starting to crumple the fabric, and he frowned in a way Felix had only seen once before; the night he’d gotten blind drunk and confessed a whole bunch of intoxicated, meaningless nothings and stumbled over himself to take it all back. Felix shook that thought from his head: there was only enough room to be angry at one thing at a time.

“So you pretended that she never existed,” Claude concluded, dragging both Felix and Sylvain away from their own thoughts. “That makes sense. What doesn’t make sense, is why anyone would then go through so much trouble to erase her. Do you think your father might have done so, to ease the pain?”

“No,” Dimitri said immediately. “He wouldn’t have done that. He kept everything of hers – it’s how I still have the locket.”

Claude hummed then, and nothing Dimitri could have done could have prepared him for his next question: “Then do you have any step-siblings?”

Felix was waiting for a firm denial, for him to say _Of course I don’t, I would have told those I trust the most,_ but all Dimitri did was flounder his words and gape at the camera.

He couldn’t hold it any longer.

“What the fuck does that mean?” Felix finally snapped. “You might have some kind of jealous, long-lost sibling hidden somewhere in Fódlan, and you didn’t think that was an important enough piece of information to give us before sending us on a wild goose chase for this stupid fucking locket?”

“Felix,” Sylvain warned, grip changing from Felix’s sleeve, to his wrist.

“What?” he growled. “We’re out here looking for it, not him. How many days of research would we have wasted before knowing something like that, if at all? It could have halved our damn search time to know that right off the bat. We’ve been going in circles for days, breaking our backs over surveillance footage and he was just sitting on the answer all along! Of course some bitter, neglected child is going to want their damn family heirloom back. This is so stupid. We should let them keep the damn thing and go home.”

“Speak for yourself,” Leonie scoffed under her breath. “Some of us want to get paid.”

“Though the execution could use some work, I have to agree with Felix,” Claude said, and had the circumstances been different, Felix might have felt a little smug. “This certainly would have been useful information to know when I _asked _you if you knew of anyone who might have a reason to take the locket.”

Dimitri had the audacity to look bewildered. “I didn’t-- I mean, I would never have thought! Patricia only mentioned having other children in passing, and I was a young, oblivious child when she told me, I’m not even sure if I’m recalling those conversations correctly, I very well could have been imagining things. And if any siblings _do _exist, I certainly haven’t heard from any of them since her death.”

“So you have absolutely no idea as to _who_ Patricia’s birth children were?”

Dimitri shook his head. “None whatsoever.” He paused. “I can’t understand how they have come to learn of _my_ existence so intimately that they knew I was in possession of the locket, and I not know even a single one of their names.”

“That is intriguing,” Claude muttered. “Though if they were the ones to remove her information, it certainly wouldn’t be surprising. They’ve gone so far as to remove evidence which in turn makes it difficult for us to track them down – we have next to no information on Patricia, and no hope of finding who she even was, let alone who her children were. No medical records, no family history, nothing. But I firmly believe that this is the angle we need to be pursuing. I find it highly unlikely for anybody else to have such a strong motive and it all adds up - the woman at Maribelle's, the Flame Emperor's message.”

“Is there anything I can do to help?” Dimitri asked, and Felix bit his tongue before he said something rude and Sylvain broke his wrist.

“If you have any rogue pieces of documentation or pictures hidden somewhere in your attic that might point us in _some_ kind of direction, that would be a start.”

“I shall look immediately,” he said, looking as though he couldn’t wait to get as far away from this conversation as he possibly could manage. “I apologise for keeping this from you, but you have to believe me when I say I hadn’t thought it relevant.”

“Relevant or not, it would have been useful to know.” Claude sighed. “Any other bombshells you wish to unveil before we part ways?”

Dimitri shook his head.

“Well, in that case, those are all the questions I have for now. The next time I’ll call you will hopefully be with a name and a location of the locket.”

“Thank you,” Dimitri said quietly, and Lysithea hung up before anything else could be said.

The following awkward silence was almost deafening. Felix could feel the uncertain stares of the team on his skin like fire and it took every ounce of his willpower not to acknowledge a single one of them. They’d gotten on great earlier; tying Caspar up and sparring, but Felix wasn’t familiar enough with a single one of them to accept an ounce of their pity or concern. Felix could only wish that he’d learned of Dimitri’s past under different circumstances, maybe then he wouldn’t have felt so much like lashing out.

His phone itched inside his pocket. He wanted to dial Dimitri up himself and demand answers of his own, but before he could even finish that train of thought, Sylvain’s hand slipped in to his pocket and took it.

“I know what you’re thinking,” he said, holding Felix’s phone out of reach. “Give yourself a few hours to calm down before you say something you regret.”

“I have nothing to say to him,” he snapped.

“You have a lot to say,” Sylvain smiled that infuriatingly pleasant smile and some of Felix’s irritation ebbed away. “I know you do, because I do too, but you’ll probably end up challenging him to some kind of to-the-death duel if you dial his number right now.” He turned to Claude then and said, “Hey, mind if we take five?”

Claude shrugged. “Do whatever you want, man. Everyone except Lorenz and Marianne is dismissed for the night.”

Sylvain grabbed Felix’s hand and dragged him out of the hotel room, and Felix all but stumbled after him. A small part of him wanted to yank his hand back and tuck it deep inside his pockets, away from Sylvain’s warmth and comfort, but the larger part of him, the more prevalent and not as intelligent part, held on to him like he was a lifeline, like Sylvain was the only thing stopping him from drowning in his guilt and resentment.

Sylvain didn’t let Felix speak until he’d dragged him all the way out in to the hotel gardens. He probably thought the soft trickling of fountain water, or the evening’s light summer breeze would soothe his mind and mood, but it was like employing a single firefighter to put out a forest fire: useless.

“We’d take bullets for him” Felix said. “Hell, you fucking _did._ And he couldn’t trust us enough to talk about his step-mother? He told Dedue, but not us?”

Sylvain sat down on a nearby bench, stretched his legs out and sighed. “It was just a shoulder wound,” he said, rolling it as though he could still feel the ache where the bullet had gone right through his skin and bone.

Felix blinked away the fog of anger clouding his vision and scowled at Sylvain. “I warned you what I’d do if you ever called it ‘just’ anything ever again.”

“Oops, my mistake,” he said, but he was smiling again and Felix tore his gaze away from his face and settled it on the fountain. After a pause, Sylvain continued, slightly more seriously, “I don’t think it was a matter of trust. I think maybe it was just hard for him to talk about it. Maybe he didn’t _want_ to talk about it. Maybe we were his escape, so to speak.”

“Really putting that psychology degree to use, aren’t you?” Felix huffed and finally took a seat. The bench was long enough to seat them both comfortably, but as soon as Felix placed himself on the opposite side, Sylvain shuffled closer until their knees were touching.

With a shrug, Sylvain said, “I just know that there are some things you don't tell some people. I mean, there are things I’ve told you that I haven’t told Dimitri. Things I wouldn’t _ever_ tell Dimitri.”

For a moment, Felix considered him: his features, softened in the evening glow, pulled in to a small smile that was sincere, rather than smug. When Sylvain turned and caught Felix’s eye, Felix scoured his brain for all of the things Sylvain had ever said to him, sifting through them and picking them apart, but he couldn’t pinpoint any single thing that might be a secret held from Dimitri.

A nervous pit suddenly opened within him, sucking all of his anger down in to it like a black hole, replacing it with anxious butterflies. “Like what?” he asked, voice uneven. 

Sylvain wrung his hands together and then wiped them on his jeans. “You know what,” he said. Felix opened his mouth to rebuke, but Sylvain continued, probably emboldened by a night spent revealing secrets. “You know exactly what I’m talking about, and you know that I meant every word.”

A drunken, slurred, _I’m in love with you, Felix,_ burned at the edges of his memory, but Felix refused to believe it held any weight. It couldn’t, because Felix wasn’t quite sure what the hell he’d do next if it did.

“You were drunk,” Felix said quietly, because he’d been avoiding this conversation for months in the hopes that it might just fade in to obscurity, that Sylvain might just forget it had ever happened. “You don’t have to pretend you feel the same way just because it might make me feel better. I’m not a kid. I can deal with it. I’ve _been_ dealing with it.”

Sylvain dropped his smile and picked up a new pissed off expression to replace it. “How many times do I have to say if for you to believe it? How many? Because I’ll say it as many times as it takes, Felix.”

Felix felt his face redden. Sylvain grabbed for his hand again, and for the second time that night, Felix didn’t yank it away, instead, he let Sylvain lace their fingers together.

“I know I was drunk that night,” he said, looking at their joined hands. “But I meant every word: I’ve been in love with you for so long I can’t even really remember when I realised. _God_ I’ve been wanting to say that properly for so long. You should have let me explain myself the moment you said you felt the same way instead of pretending it hadn’t happened.”

“But, that night,” Felix said, frowning as he remembered the way his blood had turned to ice in his veins, “you said, and I quote, ‘Oh shit I shouldn’t have fucking said that.’”

“I shouldn’t have,” Sylvain said. “Not then, not like that – I was planning this whole elaborate thing. I got you a sword commissioned—”

Felix blinked. “You what?”

“I got you a sword,” Sylvain said again with a grin. “Like, an ‘_I love you’_ sword. I still have it at home. I was waiting for the right time to give it to you, and then I fucked it up.”

“You got me a sword,” Felix said again, trying to wrap his head around everything Sylvain was saying.

“Yeah, it’s still at—”

Felix grabbed the front of his shirt and shut him up with a kiss so fierce that Sylvain almost fell off the bench. If not for their hands still linked together, and the firm fistful Felix had of Sylvain’s shirt, Felix might have been dragged on to the grassy ground with him, but he wasn’t so sure he would have given a shit. Sylvain was sober, and Sylvain was telling him that he loved him, and Sylvain had _bought him a goddamn sword._

“You’re an idiot,” Felix said between breaths.

Sylvain brought his free hand up to Felix’s face and smiled against his mouth. “Is that Felix-language for _'I love you too and want to give this a go?'”_

“Yes,” Felix said immediately, feeling like a balloon about to pop. “Yeah, I – That's exactly what it means.”

Sylvain’s smile was blinding and he caught Felix’s lips in another kiss that thawed Felix from the inside out. “Good,” he said. “God, finally. You have no idea how long I’ve wanted to do that—_Oh shit.”_

Felix’s stomach dropped and he looked at Sylvain, but Sylvain was looking off somewhere in the distance. “Don’t you fucking dare finish that with _I shouldn’t have fucking said that, _because I will stab you here in this hotel in front of all these people and go down for it, I don’t even care--_”_

“_No,_” Sylvain shook his head. “God, no. Don’t look now because it’ll be obvious, but – Oh shit, uh—”

“Spit it out,” Felix snapped.

Sylvain swallowed. “Hubert is here. Hubert the Vampire. That’s not good, right? I mean, that can’t just be a coincidence. Do you think he's looking for us? Do you think he's on to us?”

He couldn’t help it; Felix snapped his head around and looked where Sylvain was staring, and surely enough, Hubert the Vampire was standing beneath a row of hotel room windows, glancing from his phone, to the windows as though trying to work out which one his phone was depicting. Two of the many rooms they'd rented faced the gardens; Hilda's suite, and Claude's.

“Shit,” Felix said. “We need to tell the others. _Now._”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oof sorry for the wait again ive been quite busy with some other projects too , but here it is and i hope you enjoyed

**Author's Note:**

> i hope you enjoyed this chapter !!! if you want to come and talk to me about fire emblem pls come join me on twitter @ / berriesmangoes ! <33


End file.
